


Certain Dark Things

by Acantha_Echo



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Temporary Character Death, Doesn't stick, F/M, Greek myth - Freeform, The Underworld
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2019-02-13 00:38:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 151,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12971889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Acantha_Echo/pseuds/Acantha_Echo
Summary: Unable to sleep, Killian Jones takes to wandering the streets of Storybrooke, haunted by his mistakes and the fact the woman he loves is now the Dark One. If breaking himself is the price to save her, he finds he will pay it gladly.Canon divergent from the scene in the Jolly Roger in 5x03. An alternative and darker look at how it could have played out.





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at Once Upon a Time fanfiction and the first time I’ve dipped my toe into writing for a while now. I hope you will all be gentle. This has no beta so all mistakes within are my own. 
> 
> Title and poem extracts are taken from a translation of Sonnet xvii (i do not love you...) by Pablo Neruda.

## 

** Chapter One **

####  _**I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,  
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off. - Pablo Neruda**_

__  


He takes to wandering Storybrooke late at night. It’s not as though he can sleep, not when his Swan is lost to him, when she is so close and yet so far away. He thought she was far away up a beanstalk, in Neverland, walking away after giving up her magic to save him from drowning. He had thought it couldn't hurt more than when she opened a door in New York and didn't know him. He believed he had tasted the bitterness of despair when Milah had died, when he had lost his hand, when the final flickering embers of anything good in his heart had been sliced away and Captain Hook had started his bloody quest for vengeance.

After such a long life, with so, so many missteps and mistakes, Killian supposes he should be more used to being wrong.

That doesn't ease the sting though or the insomnia, and so he walks. Around the docks, around the clock tower, around the streets but in the end he alway finds himself back at the house. Her house. The house where they kissed, the house where he tried and failed to save her. As if was worthy to save her. As if she could ever find her True Love in a pirate as broken as him. She deserves so much better and Killian is so sorry that it is him.

It’s always so late it's early by the time his feet bring him here, the sky a cold grey. The sunrise hasn’t started yet, not really, but the coming sun is threatening under the horizon, the light bright enough to start to change the sky without anyone being able to see it. Light has a funny way of doing that. He stands near the gate, eyes hooded as he watches the house, as though staring at it long enough will reveal all its secrets. Silence always curls around him but he knows she is watching, waiting - hoping? Is today the day? The day he crumbles, the day he crawls and breaks. The day he crosses the yard, climbs the stairs and knocks on that door. All he has to do is move forward.

It is so easy to fall into the darkness after all.

Killian never enters through, never climbs the steps and knocks on the door. He walks away because he has to, because he has to be strong. Because for Emma, he is strong. 

(He walks away because he is weak. Because entering that house again would be so easy, even if it is the point of no return for them both. In truth, there is nothing he wants more than to be with her, to be her willing slave. He is weak and he knows if he hands himself over, if he makes that move himself then they are both lost to the darkness. Everything since he woke up has been to hide that weakness, to fight against what his heart and soul scream for. That is is worth being damned if it means being with Emma. For the lad’s sake if nothing else, he has to keep trying.)

\--

They plan during the day. Frantic whispers and quite often frustrated shouts. Books are poured over again and again, as though the words will magically change if they just will it hard enough. Somewhere, there is an answer, Killian knows this, just as he knows the answer is not in the library. Belle means well, the lass has been nothing but supportive. She, more than anyone, knows what he is going through, she should be celebrating because the Darkness is finally gone from the man she loves and they can finally have the chance that she has wanted all this time. Instead she helps them, she offers her knowledge from the years with her own Dark One, she shares all the books she has amassed over her life about the Dark One. She also offers hope in a quiet, realistic way. Never once does she rub his nose in either the harsh reality of Emma as the Dark One or on the other, take part in the over the top hope that the Charmings insist on shouting from the rooftops. Belle is simply Belle, she is there and she works hard to help - to help him, after everything he did and everything he tried to do.

Yet more proof that she has always been far too good for the Crocodile. Killian feels a surge of gratitude everytime he sees her, everytime she walks into the library with another book, another idea, or even just another cup of coffee. He doesn’t think he will ever stop feeling that warm thankfulness that she is here. Just as he never stops feeling guilty about trying to kill her - twice. She would probably forgive him if he asks her to, Belle is kind like that and she has made it clear in her actions that she doesn’t consider him that same pirate anymore. Which is why he never asks. He wants her forgiveness, he craves the knowledge that someone doesn’t hate him, but he cannot ask for it. To ask would mean accepting it if she gave it and right now, he doesn’t deserve any type of forgiveness. One day perhaps he will ask and he will let her forgive him, let it wash down the river away from them both. His heart will lighten once this is over and he will forgive himself. 

(He will never forgive himself. There are not enough fingers on his hand for all the sins he has committed, the invisible tally is past the point of remembrance. Belle is visible penance, just as everyone he has ever wronged are penance, and he holds his crimes close, lets them cut into his soul, tear him to shreds. It’s no less than he deserves.) 

Occasionally, they think they reach a triumph, an idea crystallizes into a plan and hope spreads through them all like a virus. The end result is always the same, hope turning false and they are back right back where they started, back to books and no answers. 

The answers are not in books. They are in memories, the missing six weeks that Emma stole from them, the answers were in Camelot. If only he knew what had happened, if only they could find Merlin, if only Emma hadn’t been the saviour and given herself up to the darkness, if only, if only, if only. The world doesn’t run on if only, and he can’t save the woman he loves on the strength of ‘If only’. He has to find their memories, he has to find the answers and just as importantly, the questions. It’s less about what she did and more about what he did. What did he do to her? He loves her, it is the first emotion he remembers feeling when he woke, love followed by fear, a frantic look as he tries to find her. Followed by pain as she stood in the doorway and told them all they had failed her. In truth, they hadn't all failed her.

They all know she has become the Dark Swan because of Killian Jones. Nobody actually says it out loud of course. Nobody has to. Looks and movements tell a story far better than words ever could. He can tell by the way they look at him, the disappointment etched in their faces, the way they seem to hesitate before sharing anything with him. He can almost hear the whispers that follow him from room to room, the way conversations becomes stilted around him. Killian knows what they say behind his back.

He let her down. He failed her. Nobody saves Emma Swan but Emma Swan, and he got in the way of that. His fault. All his fault. If it wasn’t for him she would have been strong enough to resist the darkness. He should have done better. He should have been better. He should have been someone else because how could Captain Hook possibly hope to help someone as wonderful as his beautiful Swan. 

\--

“I loved you.”

He knows she doesn’t understand, doesn’t hear the words for what they truly are. She hears betrayal, she hears weakness, failing. That after all his declarations of love, after everything he has done for her, this is one journey too far. 

Worse, he starts to suspect, she hears _challenge._

It's hard to explain why else she shows up just to tease him. A few words here and there, the way she leans just a fraction into him. Just enough for him to catch her scent, to feel the tease of heat. The promise of more, just a little more. All to make him admit he had lied aboard the Jolly Roger. Her lips curl into a cruel smile as she taunts with her form, a twist of rich red that is both seductive and downright terrifying. Emma knows the effect she has on him, knows how to make his body beg and yearn while his mind trembles and denies. 

Emma doesn't know that he spoke the truth that day.

He loved her. He loves her. He will love her. Past, present, future, they are all bundled up inside of him. She is his everything since they kissed in the accursed Neverland. Since he threw away chance after chance to skin himself a Crocodile and how easy it would have been to try and kill once more. Killin isn't a fool, he has always known his revenge was his end. It has never bothered him in the past, the plan was kill the Crocodile, the end. Get his revenge and he would be sated, spent. So what if he died in the attempt, at least his long life would be over. Until Emma. Until they kissed and Killian Jones was exposed, his aching heart put on show once more. Hundreds of years with nothing to fuel him but his revenge and he gave it all up for her.

It is almost insulting, that she believes he has given up on her. On them.

He loved the Emma she had been, the Emma he knows in his heart that she wants to be again. Given the chance, the choice, his golden haired beauty would scorn the power of the Dark One. It's a choice she can't make while she is drowning in it, while it fills every aspect of her, twisting everything in its path. That Emma is all but lost to him now, an ache that chases his every woken moment.

Killian knows he loves the Emma she is right now, the Dark Swan. She is beautiful and terrible at the same time. The chill of a winter dawn, the tug and pull of the coldest tide. Every breath he takes just brings in more of her, her scent, her looks. The way she moves, all leather bound, a grace that is almost unnatural. Even when she isn't in front of him, the male can't help but think of his emerald eyed love, can't help but fall deeper. He is drowning in everything she is now. Perhaps his Swan is a siren, luring him to his end, to admitting the truth - he loves her with every doom laden end breath. But what a doom.

Is it a sin to love a Dark One? What is one more sin for a soul drenched in them?

And in the end, no matter if she chooses to fight against the darkness once more or if she embraces it to the end, he knows he will always love her. He will go to his grave loving her.

\--

He must sleep sometime. Just because he doesn’t remember falling asleep, just because he can't recall the last time he slept in an actual bed doesn’t change the fact that he must have gotten some sleep over the past week. Snatches of it in a chair perhaps, awake before he realises he was asleep. Just enough to keep him going. In a way, he is grateful for this lack of sleep. A full night's rest would almost certainly come complete with night terrors. There are so many demons in his past, so many bad days that it is a wonder he ever gets a proper night free. Losing Emma has added to those demons ten times over. Perhaps that is why he cannot sleep, perhaps he is too scared, too worried to allow himself to sleep and be trapped with the ghosts of his failures, with Milah, with Liam, with Emma. 

So he survives on the brief moments he must get, and tries not to think about it. There are other things he cannot escape, other things he tries to ignore as best he can, such as the headache that plagues him, refusing him any relief. It's been bothering him for days now, tension in the back of his neck and shoulders, a sharp stabbing pain. It’s a knife and it twists and turns constantly throughout the day. The pain drains him, eyebrows pinched together as the hours draw on without any release in sight. Even his beloved rum does little to ease it and eventually, he is forced to consider other options.

This realm is the land without magic, and although this is so much he still doesn’t understand - and so much that seems like magic, the talking phone, the internet to name but a few - he knows that they have adapted. Created things to make up for no magic, sent messages in ways other than bird, strange horseless carriages that moved by themselves, healed without the use of potions and spells. 

Medicinal herbs are something he understands. Plants, leaves, roots, that can be crushed, cooked, prepared in certain ways to give comfort, to aid the healing. They always come with a price and the stronger the healing properties, the stronger the price. Then there are other things, purely magical things, things which should not heal. Water, in an innocent looking spring comes to mind, something so simple but it's healing had been a curse. If only he had asked the price. Why had he never asked the price?

He doesn’t understand the thing they call drugs, the shear strength of them, the power and they are normally rather odd. He can remember the hospital after that car had hit him. They eased the aches and pains while at the same time changing his mind. It was as though he was a young lad again, unable to hold his liquor. They make him hallucinate, or think he is hallucinating, they take away his control, his thoughts. Blue Jello is not an improvement on potions from the Enchanted Forest. If the discomfort is the price, then it is a strangely weak price for how they took away the pain and sped up the healing. It is so easy to get ahold of them as well and surely, if nothing else, rarity should be the price. 

White pills sit in the palm of his hand, small and innocent looking. The packet promises fast relief, swallow them with water - always water - and all would be well. The list of ingredients on the back are in tiny writing, so many words and so few that Killian understands. Perhaps this is the price, to take on trust the idea that these will actually heal him. So he doesn’t understand the power of these things, just as he doesn’t understand magic. He understands all too well the power of plants, Dreamshade forever lurking in his mind. He doesn’t need to know the details, to understand exactly how things work, to understand that they do.

Water helps them down as promised, Killian impatiently counting the time, and the packet promised fast, the packet promised noticeable relief.

He gets neither.

\--

In the end, she is the one who breaks first. 

They are huddled around yet more books in the library, books Killian swears they have already looked through. The answer still isn't here, it was never here and he doesn't know how much more of this he can take. Leg bounces a little, a restless motion that he can't control. It jerks up and down, up and down, up and down.

“Hook,” Charming growls from across the table, lips thinning. “Quit it already.”

“Pardon me, Mate,” he answers, voice plucking the t in a sharp click, letting his eyebrow lift as he offers a sardonic smile to the Prince. “Sorry my sitting is offending you. Am I breathing to loud as well?” Everyone is tense, wound up by the lack of progress and he knows his sarcastic reply isn't helping. He can't pretend he really cares in this moment. Snow puts her hand on her husband's arm, the motion instantly calming him. Killian hates this. In this moment he hates them. For being together, for being able to draw comfort from each other, from something as simple as being able to touch each other. Selfish, unfair, he knows. They have been through so much, have suffered and lost and struggled and who is he to begrudge them the ability to be together now? Captain Hook is selfish, Killian Jones is selfish, and he will damn well begrudge them this when he is barely holding himself together.

His headache grows. Maybe after this he will go back to that Dark Star Pharmacy. The dwarf has already tried to fob him off with some excuse about having already sold him the strongest possible pain killers, and something about being dangerous, not allowed to sell more in case he takes too many and other words that he has completely forgotten. He will go back and let his hook do the talking if that is what it takes to get some relief. There has to be something to cure this physical pain since he can’t cure his mental one.

Smoke pools on the table and suddenly, she is there, as if summoned by his constant thoughts of her. Crouched on wood as she makes a wholly unneeded dramatic entrance. Books go flying, chairs are pushed back as they jump in surprise, forming a standing circle around her. She is the center of attention, as she should be. His eyes are drawn to her, just as he is drawn to her whenever she appears, no matter what. Gods, but Emma is beautiful. Silver white hair is tied into a sharp bun, snow white feathers behind her ears as she really plays up the swan thing. Lips that same rich red and he has fantasized about kissing them for so long. They finish kissing and he is imagining kissing her again. She is posed, regal, unreal. An angel - even if she might be an angel of death. It hasn’t been that long since he last saw her and yet Killian finds himself staring all the same. Drinking in her features greedily, as though he is a drowning man and she is his air. All this time he has known her and yet Killian has never drank his fill of her. He suspects he never will.

“Bloody hell.”

Emma all but flows down off the table, a single, billowing motion. The rest of the world seems to dim, to fade away until it is just the two of them. David could shout in his ear and Killian thinks he would not hear it. Not when she is looking at him, when her full attention is on him and him alone. Her hand curls around his hook and he finds himself powerless to pull away, frozen in place by how near she is, caught by the tender way her fingers brush over his metal. It takes him another moment to realise that he is literally frozen, whole body trapped in place. Blue eyes finally flick away from Emma to take in the rest of the room. Anger is written on Regina’s face, she has always hated being trapped. He can see panic, frustration written in David and the Lady Snow’s features as they try and move, as they call out to their daughter.

A shiver runs down his back at the knowledge Emma is completely ignoring them to focus on him. He can’t help the fissure of dark delight that unfurls in the pit of his stomach at knowing she wants him instead of them.

“Come with me Hook.”

Snort is forced, Killian having to bite down the urge to say _yes_ , to say _finally_ , to push aside that dark glee. He isn’t sure what she wants, but as much as it pains him to think it, he knows it probably isn’t good. More mind games, more talking in circles and trying to get him to agree without knowing the price. Without understanding the piece. Without even understanding what the deal is.

“Not a chance love.”

Green eyes narrow in frustration, in being denied. Emma has never liked it when people say no to her, she is used to being in charge. To be the one who walks or runs away. For so long he has let her set the pace, he knows she is wounded, knows her walls are high. It is rare for him to say no to her, and he dislikes it as much as she does. Killian musters all his strength to give her a cocky smile, one that is pure Hook through and through. Fake of course, and he knows she knows it too but he can't go down without a fight. He can’t give up on them without a fight. Pale fingers drop away from his hook, breaking the contact between them although he finds himself as frozen as before. 

“Wrong answer.”

She takes him anyway.

\--

They reappear in a bedroom. Hers? He doesn't know, he's never been upstairs in this house before. It’s decorated much like the glimpses he’s seen downstairs, grey and subdued. Designed for practicality, not enjoyment. Everything is rich, well designed and he doesn’t have to test the fabric of the thick long curtains or touch the wood of the elaborately carved desk to know that is of the highest quality. Dark Ones always liked their creature comforts but none of this is Emma. She would have picked colour, she would have picked comfort but it wouldn’t be so ornate, so... regal. His Princess hadn’t grown up a Princess on the outside and even when she was growing comfortable with her heritage he knows she would never decorate her room like this. Eyes take in the rest of the room, the bookcase that is sparsely filled, titles he can’t read from this distance. There is a wooden ship on the top shelf, something delicate and gaily coloured, sails half unfurled as though it is ready to set sail, to take flight. Fingers itch with the urge to move closer, to examine what he already knows is a perfectly recreated model of his ship. She keeps a copy of his ship in her bedroom. Another puzzle to try and work out, because this might be her personal space, where she doesn’t have to play a role. Hell, for all he knew, this might be a place she never visits because she doesn’t need to sleep. So it's either important to her or the complete opposite and he wishes just once something would make sense. 

The Dark One stalks towards him, an intent look on her face. This woman in this moment is more dark than not. She looks as though she wants to devour him, as if she is memorizing every line, every hair, every inhale and exhale. Her legs move forward and he moves back, a synchronized dance that is pure instinct. She is his weakness and her touch is how it ends, how he crumbles. The back of his calves bump into the bed, jolting against wood and a thick mattress. Trapping him in place almost because in the next second Emma is there, hand resting lightly on his chest, staring up at him in that same intent, memorizing fashion. As though she needs to reassure herself it is Killian standing in front of her and not some stranger. Fingers gently glide up his shirt, teasing under the leather, as she nudges her way between layers of clothing. Her touch is featherlight, almost non existent now so that only the very tips of her fingers brush over where his heart beats, tapping out a song. She must be able to feel it, possibly even hear it as it screams out his love for her. This gentless is torture, waiting for the penny to drop, waiting to find out why she is doing any of this. Why did she bring him to this maybe important room in the first place. 

Expression softens, something girly, innocent as her touch moves ever higher. Hand lifts to brush against his cheek, against his stubble. Killian wants to be strong, wants to pull away, his jaw flexes as he wars within himself. She isn’t Emma but she is. She is the Dark One but she isn’t. She is the sun and the moon and all the stars in the sky and right now she is touching him. He’s too weak to deny himself this moment. One more. Just one more moment, one second of softness, gods forgive him, just one moment like this. It is a betrayal to what they had once been, just as it is a betrayal to her family but he is so weak. He has missed her touch so much, and it is in this moment that he finally feels like he is home.

At least her hair is still up, ice blond instead of the warm gold. She isn’t hiding behind a mask, behind a ghost and Killian breathes a silent prayer for that at least. To see the old Emma would undo him. This Emma threatens to undo him and gods above and below he loves her still. Loves her so much it hurts, his heart straining against his chest. He loves her and she uses him. He loves her and he walks away. He loves her and he claims to know what is best for her. Best for them. It hurts, it hurts and he doesn’t know what he is supposed to do anymore. 

“You need to sleep Killian,” she murmurs, as though able to read his mind, hint of concern and worry threaded through her otherwise cold voice. Thoughts snap away from the wondering of what he is supposed to do, to wondering what she really wants. Open book. She always had been to him. Even on a beanstalk when she was closed off and guarded, he had been able to read her. Now, now the language is different, the words take on new meaning but he can still pick out details, can glean hints but it's not enough. It is never enough. She is concerned about his lack of sleep, that much is blindingly clear to him, but what he can’t work out, what he can’t read in features that struggle to remain neutral is the why. It’s more than the concern of a loved one not getting enough sleep, something else is at play here. Heart beats all the more painfully, a half formed thought that this is connected, this is somehow linked to Camelot. This is a question that fits into those lost answers. If only he can decipher what the question actually is.

Forehead creases together in a frown, Killian’s mouth opening to ask a question, to ask why but she is already pulling back from him, hand slipping from his skin. She can read him too, he had forgotten that, somehow he had let himself forget that. Part of him can’t help but mourn the lack of heat, the contact between them as her walls slam back up and the hints of Emma are lost once more behind the Dark Swan. 

Finger click together suddenly, grabbing at air in front of him as if there is something tangible there, and he is falling, he is falling and there is nothing but darkness.

\--

She returns him in the morning.

As though he is some mere possession, something she borrowed for the night and is now giving back. As if he isn't worth more than a night. Before Emma, the idea of spending more than a few hours with any woman would have been laughable. Inconceivable. The idea of Hook sleeping - simply sleeping - beside a beautiful woman for those hours would have been even harder to believe. Now though, now Killian is Killian again as well as Hook and the hurt burns all the way down with the rum as he locks himself in the bathroom, away from the suspicious looks and questions he doesn't have answers to. Outside the door, he can hear David and the Lady Snow, trying to talk to him, to ask him questions. One even tries the door handle, his tremors increasing as it slowly turns. Lock holds, Killian holding his breath in turn as he stares at it, some part of him half expecting David to break down the door in his quest for answers. There is a moment's pause, a heavy moment where he feels as though he is standing on the edge of a knife before the sound of footsteps fade away as the pair move. As they give him space, give him time, Killian forcing down the choking sob that wants to break free at that. Despite wanting, needing to know what happened, needing to know if their little girl is still in there, they are giving him this moment. It might just be a moment, he has no idea how long they will wait but it might give him the time to try and get his thoughts in order, to have answers to the questions that burn in them all.

They did nothing but sleep - or, at least, he slept a magical sleep and she did whatever it was she did during the night. There were no dreams, nothing that he can remember in morning light and Killian supposes he should be grateful for that at least. Grateful. Again, as though he is some dog, some pet, whining for pathetic scraps and willing to take whatever was offered. To be returned once his use was done.

All he can think about however is the way she returned him. The casual dismissiveness, the completely empty tone of voice when she had said he could go. Emma didn’t even bother to look at him, just flicks her wrist, lets the smoke curl around him. Transporting him before he can so much as blink. He must look a state when he reappears in the loft, by the kitchen counter. Still wearing the clothing from yesterday, all rumpled and creased. Hair sticking up all over the place, not his usual artful mess, not even the normal bedhead that even devilishly handsome pirates get. David and Lady Snow jump up from the sofa, a startled look in their eyes. 

“Hook!” No doubt they say more, but Killian can’t stand there and listen. He stumbles to the side, hand reaching out to snag the bottle of rum he’d left there a few nights before and then he is moving forward, pushing past them. There is no thought in his mind except the desire to get away, and he almost falls over his own feet as he lurches up the stairs and into the bathroom. Bottle trembles in his hand, his grip so tight his knuckles are turning white. 

It is irrational, this hurt. Since the missing weeks, he has always been the one to push away, to remind the Dark One that it is Emma he loves, the Emma she was and that Emma is the one who holds his heart still, who he wants back. He walks away time after time after time. Perhaps it is only fitting that she finally pays him back in his own coin. 

Somehow, that doesn’t ease the sting, doesn’t calm him down. His whole body shakes with some contained energy, emotion he can’t quite put a name to. It's not as though he wants her to keep him, he doesn't want to remain in that house with her.

(Yes, he does)

Something is terribly wrong. Killian wants to laugh at the wild thought that spins through his mind, as though anything about his life that is right. He wants to laugh until the sound turns to sobs, until he is unmanned and unmade. It wouldn’t be good form to be so selfish, to give into such base desires. He can’t hide in the Charming’s bathroom forever, no matter how tempting that feels with a bottle firmly in his possession. Another sip for luck, for strength and he forces himself over to the mirror, to try and put his mask back in place. Tidy himself up before facing her family and he will face her family, he is many things but he refuses to be a coward. Weak, a villain, but never a coward. A pale face stares back at him, dark shadows under his eyes that have nothing to do with the Kohl, a haunted gaze that reminds him all too painfully of the months and years after Milah. 

Something is still terribly wrong.

Besides his Dark Swan. This is something else. Something new. Something... other, is terribly wrong. He is missing something, he feels as though he might be a step closer but at the same time, still miles away from port, from his safe haven. It is in the back of his mind, on the tip of his tongue, Killian knows the answer is right there, in the corner of his eye. If he could only turn his head and see it. 

\--

The darkness calls to him in the night. Louder than before, louder because he has tasted the forbidden fruit and all he wants to do is fall back into it - into her. It’s whispers to him, voice seductive, sensual, feminine. It whispers and it's Emma calling to him. Killian tries to fight. He needs to remain strong but its hard when the night is long and cold. When he still can’t sleep without her and although it takes him longer, he always finds himself back in front of the house as the sun rises, letting the light banish his weakness.

Henry stays up with him most nights now, for a few hours at least, a brief moment when he can push the voices away. Nobody has brought up his little breakdown in the bathroom and he is glad for that. They bring up the night before of course, and Killian just wishes he could be more helpful, that he could have seen or said something more before she knocked him out. He slept, she made him sleep is all he says and for some reason they seem to accept that. The darkness will be back when Henry sleeps, and the cycle will start again but in this moment it is enough. There isn't much talking, and for that Killian is grateful. He’s had enough of the speeches, the bargering on about how it was important not to lose hope, how they wouldn’t give up on her and he wants to scream and scream and scream until he has no voice left. Sometimes, Killian bites down on his lip so hard to contain the sound that wants to escape, he draws blood, the copper tang filling his mouth. 

Blood seems to silence the darkness for a few moments. Sate it perhaps.

The speeches never stop and he learns to tune most of them out for his own sanity, to nod at the right moment, because its thats or the screams. Then everyone goes to sleep and it's just him and Henry, and few words exchanged between them. Killian feels like he should be the one giving the hope speeches to Henry and that scares him almost as much as the darkness does. He has no right to those speeches, he isn’t Henry’s dad, he isn’t - he isn’t anything and it hurts, how much that hurts. He is letting down Henry and he doesn’t know how to fix this. Hook broke things, Hook pillaged and plundered and never had to deal with the consequences of his actions - well,never bar once. Never except for Baelfire and that is a wound he cannot bare to look at. Especially when he is dealing with Bae’s son and all the old mistakes are new again.

They tend to watch a movie a night, one of Henry’s endless ‘Operations’, something about showing Killian how this world saw them. He promises they will watch his Swans favourite only when she is back. Henry even promises that Killian will enjoy it too, that it has pirates in and princesses and true love. For a moment, he even allows himself a small brush of hope, imagining a future where he can tease his Swan, a secret romantic and he always knew she had this softer side, that under her tough exterior she believed in love. For a moment at least and then pessimism rears its ugly head once more, a voice whispering in the back of his mind at how easy everything can remain broken and ruined.

Some of the movies are better than others. Pinocchio is alright, his Swan’s friend is a lot less of a threat when he's a cartoon. And a boy. Sleeping Beauty brings unpleasant memories and thoughts to him, a shift in his seat and he was such a villain to her. Taking her heart while she slept, it hadn’t been good form. He can remember it so clearly, the anger, the desperation. Determined to get his revenge and worm his way back into Cora’s good graces. Setting her free after taking her heart as she slept so they had a princess to use and abuse had seened the best way to get to Storybrooke. For a brief second he had toyed with the idea of actually setting her free, of behind honest and trusting that Emma would see his rescue of the princess for the olive branch it was. Of course, that would have meant actually trusting the Saviour, something that hadn’t worked out too well for him last time. He didn't like being double crossed, and he couldn't trust her again so stealing sleeping beauty’s heart was the way forward. Best to betray rather than be betrayed further.

Yet another to add to his endless list of regrets. Sometimes he feels as though he will split apart at the seams, he is so very full of regrets.

Saving her heart had helped but Killian isn’t naive enough to believe that it evens the scales and makes up for stealing her heart in the first place.

Robin Hood actually makes him smile a little, distracts him from the world that is crumbling around him. Robin as a fox is something Killian thinks he can watch again and again. Certainly worth teasing the other man about it, that this world sees him as a walking talking, furry animal. Its another night where things are almost - almost - normal. Killian isn't sure why there is so much singing though. He likes the Whistle Stop song, but that's mostly music. It seems like all these fictional representations of people he knows cannot wait to burst into song as if it's a compulsion. Try as he might, he struggles to imagine Regina or even David belting out a tune. God help him, what if their version of Captain Hook sings? 

There are some he won’t watch. 

Peter Pan, for obvious reasons. 

Beauty and the Beast, because he cannot watch any version of the Crocodile get a happy ending even if it means he doesn’t get to see Belle at peace.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. He’s not ready to watch Swan’s parents get their happily ever after, not when he has to live the reality of it every day.

(He's not ready to put the lad through that. Although Killian knows this is fiction, some warped, messed up version of the truth, he will be damned if he lets Henry watch another mother be the villain of the piece.)

\--

She finds him every couple of nights. There is subtlety in her actions now, she always waits till Henry has gone to bed and he is alone. More often than not, she will wait until he is roaming the streets of the quiet town, pop up behind him with her ever present smirk, a teasing greeting on her lips. His Swan has become bold in her quest, she is more confident of her power over him now, as though that was ever the question. So she finds him, and he always argues, but it is halfhearted at best, already turning to slot in against her, to breath in her scent. He lets himself believe the lie, lets himself think he is still strong, that he fights her, fights the teleportation. That the smudges of lipstick that brush against his jaw are from when he tries to pull away. She has always liked kissing his jaw where it tensed and shifted. This version of Emma is no different, except she enjoys making him tense in all the wrong ways as well as the right.

They never kiss on the lips. He can’t bring himself to do that and so he contents himself with lavishing attention, worship, on a small part of her skin. He chooses a different spot every time, the skin behind her ear one night, above her nose the other. By far and away his favorite spot is the hollow of her neck, able to feel each strangled gasp. There is a conversation they need to have here but he can never find the words. Sometimes, he can barely look her in the eye, just wordlessly kissing part of her before she finally sends him to sleep.

Without her help, rest is impossible. He is addicted, Killian has drank too much rum and explored too many dark sides of humanity to be able to deny that. He knows the pull of addiction, the dark tides that carry you so far from familiar shores. He has seen good - and bad - men change, twist and buckle under the strain of addiction. The changes wrought by their addictions were always subtle at first, slipping in under the skin and corrupting the soul. You never realise you are addicted until it is far too late.

Perhaps he has always been addicted. She is rather like a drug, from the moment she held a knife to his throat he has been drunk on her. His Swan helps him sleep though, fingers forever grabbing at some invisible knot on his forehead to grant him escape. He sleeps and he doesn’t dream. He sleeps and he feels a little better, the headache fades to a passing annoyance. He sleeps and he is addicted. Is it still Emma he is addicted to? Or is it just the magic she uses to grant him sleep?

(Emma. It’s always Emma.)

Swan always wakes him before dawn, she appears to care enough to care that he isn’t ready to tell her parents what he is doing at night. It doesn’t matter that it's something as innocent as sleeping, he is spending time with her when he should be working on saving her - they will not understand. Or worse perhaps, they will. They will see how weak he is and so she returns him to the Jolly Roger for the sunrise, leaves him with another smug smile, a smile that is as much as shield and armour as any he throws her back in return. The sea has always given him some measure of peace, watching the horizon as if it holds the answer, and once again, he pretends. Pretends as though he isn’t giving into the darkness bit by bit. 

\--

In the end, he is the one who breaks last.

It's a night she doesn't come to him and at first it is like all the nights that came before it. Henry puts on some movie that Killian tries to enjoy, although by the end of it he can barely string together two sentences about what actually happened. The lad, bless him, doesn’t seem at all put off by his lack of enthusiasm, simply shrugging and promising he will pick a better one tomorrow night. All too soon though, yawns and a nodding head drive Henry to his own room and Killian is left alone.

Like all nights that have come before it, eventually the urge to walk is overpowering. His movements are restless, uncertain as he prowls through the night. Experience has taught him how to tell if Emma is following him, waiting for her moment to strike. Anticipation curls in the pit of his stomach on those nights and he finds himself lingering in more public places, taking his time, a tease of his own before he allows himself to be taken. Although there are still some nights when she is able to surprise him, when Swan seems to decide seconds before she arrives that she is going to find him, he knows with certainty that she is not coming tonight. Instead, he is alone.

Killian is suddenly so very tired. 

So very done with hurting, with being alone. Legs carry him the rest of the way without any conscious thought, drawing him straight to the house. It is strange to see it near midnight, shadows covering new angles, a silent sentry to their past and future. Only now that he is here, does Killian even stop to wonder if she is here too. They have been dancing this dance for so many nights now and yet he is no closer to understanding his Dark Swan, to knowing what she does during the time when she isn’t moving with him. 

Just for a moment he stands by the gate. Only a moment and the dam finally breaks. He crosses the yard. Climbs the stairs. Knocks on the door. 

The knock sounds louder than it should, echoing around the otherwise silent garden. He feels like an intruder suddenly, breaking in on a moment that she has not allowed him. What if she is not here? What if she doesn’t actually want him anymore, not beyond the stolen moments she picks. Doubts eat away at him as precious seconds tick by. Door creaks open, apparently of its own accord, the pale light from a tableside light spilling out to illuminate him as he stands there, gaze fixed on the woman who stands a few feet away. 

“Swan...” _At last_ he wants to say, lips curling into a relieved smile at the sight of her. Expression is slightly more guarded on her face as he moves forward, drawn slowly and steadily to stand in front of her. Addicted indeed. Head tilts ever so subtly to the side as she watches him, waiting. She makes no effort to speak or pull away, letting him take the lead once more. Fingers find her own, brushing over her thumb in a soft greeting before he lets them lace tightly with her own. It feels so good to just be selfish once more, to have this, just drawing in comfort from the fact that she is right there in front of him. He is able to reach out and touch her as he wills without a barbed comment from a Queen or worried eyes from her parents. Together they are able to just be. They walk in silence up the stairs to the room that he has mentally taken to calling ‘theirs'. It is the first time they have walked to it, the first time there has been anything more than the promise - threat? - of sleep. No words pass between them, and Killian finds strength in that, because he doesn’t know what to say in this moment, this conversation they have been building to since she first took his hook in the library. How do you admit you were hurting yourself to try and save yourself without it sounding stupid? How do you admit you were still right, but also wrong, and too weak to try fighting that way anymore. This isn’t giving up. He tells himself over and over again, it isn’t giving up, it is just a different way to try and save her.

She hesitates by the bed once they reach their destination, eyes drifting down to stare at their boots. All the confidence of their previous encounters is washed away by that little moment, by the way she wraps one arm around herself and draws in a deep, shuddering breath. He realises he is not the only one hurting during the night. When she brings green eyes up to meet blue, Killian can’t help but suck in a sharp breath of pain at what he sees there. The words are written on her features and in this moment, she makes no effort to hide them. 

_Is this just for sleep? Is that all you need me for? Do you still love me? Can you still love me?_

He can take the cold. He can take the manipulation, the dark swan, the twisting and turning. He can even take her self righteous anger as she tries so hard to convince them both that the darkness is what she wants. He was able to take that watery smile on the Jolly Roger, but this... this he cannot take. He cannot take the naked pain, the betrayal and the belief that he is looking for rest and nothing else, that he is just like everyone else who has come before, always looking for what they can take and not what they can give in return. 

“Don’t send me away again,” he breathes, voice broken, words a question, a plea, a prayer. Before she can answer he is pressing close, hands catching at her side and back, drawing her in for a kiss. Lips finally find lips, the kiss he has denied them both for so long. Everything he wishes he can say, he pushes into that kiss. The desperation, the apology, the need to be with her once more. This is home, she is home and he can’t find the words. Heat spreads as they kiss, all teeth and force, it lacks the softness of how they can kiss, the lazy indulgence of days gone by. This is hello, this is I’ve missed you, this is it all. They kiss until oxygen becomes a problem, and even then it takes most of his willpower to pull away, chest heaving heavily. It isn’t until a few seconds after they break apart that he notices he is crying. Her own eyes are suspiciously damp, bright as he leans against her, forehead pressed to forehead. 

“It's going to be alright Killian, I promise,” she whispers into his hair, cheek pressing against his head. He can feel her breath against his skin, each little inhale and exhale. The world narrows to this moment, to the sensation of her breath against him, her heat pressed up against his taller frame. Arms are still tightly wrapped around her form, as if he can somehow melt into her, Emma returning the hold just as tightly.

“I will fix this, I will fix us.”

He wishes he can believe her.

\--

They are angry.

In all honesty, Killian can't blame them. He has spent so long fighting by their side, trying to bring Emma back and now he stands opposite them, leather jacket brushing against Swan’s own. By her side, as he should be, even if that means the rest of the town hate him once more. He's well used to hate.

There is no real reason for him to be here, he knows this. He has no magic, no desire to actually hurt those he still considers friends. But the thought of leaving Emma alone to face the confusion and anger of those who love her is more than he can bear. It doesn’t help that the reason they are here in the first place is because of him. He didn’t show up for the daily research session, didn’t show up for Henry’s movie and Killian wonders if they are genuine in their worry for him as Killian Jones, or him as Captain Hook, possible cannon fodder and all round distraction when they take on the Dark One.

Either way, he will not let her stand solo any longer. That was the whole point of his choice, and so he quietly pulls open the front door of her home, to where she stands with her back to him. Hands rest on her hips as she faces the small group that have gathered on the lawn. He feels as though he is walking to the gallows as he descends the steps of the house, coming to a stop beside her. Eyes lower, unable to meet their gaze, staring at his boots for a moment before he huffs. He is no coward. This is his choice, his bed and he will lie in it. 

It stings but he knows that the pain will pass in time. It’s a choice he has made plenty of times in the past, weighed up his love for Emma Swan against a multitude of other things. Even when he had little more than the vague hope that she might feel the same way for him, he had been willing to trade his home to save her. Knowing she feels the same, what is his friendships, his happiness, his soul?

Realization seems to dawn on Regina’s face first, the not so evil, Evil Queen quickest on the uptake. Scowl forms on her face, rage burning in her eyes and all verbal hell breaks loose.

\--

He seems to accept their anger better than she does. Maybe it's because he is used to being a disappointment, to people turning on him at the slightest little misstep. One mistake and he is right back to being a no good dirty pirate. If he is shaking, then it is only because of the adrenaline still coursing through his body and not the pain of knowing all the years in Storybrooke have been undone. All the friendship, the nights with Henry, the silent moments with David where he feels maybe the other man doesn’t completely hate him, all the light hearted jokes and gentle comfort from Belle, all is lost. Casually, he lets himself drop onto the comfortable - expensive - chair in her living room, ignoring the tremor running through his hand. It took longer than he expected to make them leave, their anger turning the air blue, angry words shot through with disgust, with betrayal. In the end, Emma had grown impatient, waved her hand and whisked them all to the other side of the town, a silent signal that the conversation was over. They won’t listen. They never have before, so why would they start now. He knows they will be back, that they will demand their pound of flesh. They are not done with him.

(He made his choice. He would make exactly the same one again, even knowing this is the outcome.)

“I can't believe they acted that way.”

“It’s fine love, I've been called far worse than a lovesick puppy dog. They just think I'm a fool.” Voice is light, glib as he shrugs. Comforting her is more important than how he feels.

“No, that’s not why they are angry,” she replies, voice little more than a throaty whisper and he can’t tell if it's a question or a realization. Eyes close because he doesn't want this conversation, he doesn't want to hear the doubt in her voice, to see it in cool green eyes. He can take Charming and the Lady Snow doubting him - they have always doubted him and a small voice in the back of his mind thinks they always will, that there is no feat he could perform that could possibly make up for the fact he is a pirate, that he is the infamous Captain Hook. It’s probably not the best time to bring up the fact only half the tales people spun about him were true and the other half the result of rum colouring dashing memories. He will never be good enough for their Princess and this choice has just proven he was waiting... waiting for his chance. Fingers curl into a tight fist that still shakes subtly despite his internal orders for it to cease, clenched against the arm of the chair as he sits there, knowing without having to look that she is putting all the pieces together. Sharp as a needle, his Swan, always had been. There are moments when he wishes she wasn’t so perceptive. This is one of them.

“They think you like it. That you want the power, the darkness.”

The pirate who would do anything, no matter how dark, no matter how evil, to have his vengeance. Who had fought against The Dark One for hundreds of years and maybe, just maybe, didn’t know how to exist without it. 

The villain who doesn’t deserve any kind of happy ending. 

(She was his happy ending. He told her that once and some part of him wonders if she remembers that. If maybe, buried in all her memories, in the push and pull of light and dark, she remembers the moment he said they were doomed because he loves her and now she burns because of it. He wonders if she hates him as much as he hates himself in this moment.)

“Killian,” she breathes, and he can feel her breath against his cheek, the delicate way she plays with his hair as her weight settles across his lap, every movement a tease. It is torture as she shifts, getting more comfortable and making him hard, Killian swallowing down the moan that wants to slip free as her legs slide against him. “My pirate,” she adds, fingers still dancing at the nape of his neck. There is something so familiar about her motions - not that she was much for sitting in his lap before, for squirming slightly every now and then, she would have given him one of her iciest glares if he had so much as suggested the idea of a lap dance. The gentle touches, fingers threading through hair, that, that is familiar. 

It’s pure Emma. Emma in the moments when she is too tired or too happy to remember she is supposed to be keeping her walls up high. It’s the Emma he remembers blending with the Emma she has become. Her laugh is musical, light but there is a sharpness under it, a hint of deep sadness, aimed at - at - well Killian isn’t sure what it is aimed at, not at himself, not even at her parents. It is enough to make him open his eyes again and his whole world narrows to her. She smiles down at him, that amused, enigmatic smile as though she knows something he doesn’t. Mouth drops open a little in response, unable to do anything else but stare at her. Smile slips, lips twisting into something sadder like her tone, but still real, still her and gods, he has missed her more than he thought possible. Any amount of anger, pain, torturous pleasure is worth this sight and the hope that blossoms painfully despite himself.

“Trust me my pirate, I know the last thing you want, is this power.”

\--

“Do you... do you remember what I said on the ship? All I need is your trust?” Despite the air of nonchalance that Emma attempts, her posture reveals this is anything but. She stands so stiffly, her eyes dart this way and that, unable to meet his gaze as they stand there, once more in their bedroom. Fingers twitch slightly, arms held straight by her side. She looks as though she wishes she was anywhere but here, and he marvels at the way she has managed to train her voice to be calm, to be the all seeing, unfeeling Dark One but can’t seem to convince her body to follow suit.

This is the moment he realises. The one that will make or break them.

Killian simply nods, throat too dry to speak. He doesn’t want to speak anyway, in fear that his voice will somehow break this moment this is creating around them, the one where perhaps, just perhaps, he will finally learn why. 

“Trust me now?”

This is not that moment he realises.

All Killian can do is nod again. Dark One lies, Dark One tricks. He lets out the breath that he doesn’t even realise he is holding. One of the first sayings he learnt when his new meaning of life revolved around looking for a way to end the Dark One. He knows that is still the meaning of his life, albeit in a different manner. Before had meant simple bloodlust and needing it quelled. Now he seeks a far more difficult resolution, an answer that doesn’t result in death. Can it be as simple as simply trusting her? 

Her eyes dart to the side after he nods, looking at something that isn’t there, Killian following her gaze. Thin air seems to be all she is looking at, a blank space and he wonders where she has gone in her mind. What past event is she seemingly relieving, trapped within her own head. Something from Camelot perhaps? Did he not trust her then? This missing time is killing him, driving him mad as he tears his gaze from where she is looking to take her once more.

For a moment, Killian could have sworn that he can see a black shadow at her shoulder. A blink, and it is gone.

Her own blank gaze is gone as well, small smile dancing on her features, as she stares up at him. The care and worry of previous nights are gone as she stands there, hands clasped together. With a giggle - an honest to god giggle - she spins in a graceful circle, arms lifted, palms outstretched. All Killian can do is watch in wonder as gold spreads around the room for a moment, vanishing through some of the walls, a shimmering net before it fades away. There is something breathtaking about her magic when it is fueled by light and he dares to hope, fueled by love for him. Not that it is an excuse. You can love and still commit deeds of the darkest sin. He knows love is not good on its own, love is selfish, love is cruel, love can bring the world burning down around you. Love is a weapon and a curse. Killian has to hope that their love can withstand all the negative power such emotion brings.

“What did you do?” he murmurs in wonder, still staring at the space where the gold had glowed moments before. 

“It’s a barrier, to protect you. Just for a little while, just... give me a day. Be patient my pirate. Nobody but me will be able to get into this room.” She hesitates for a moment, voice little more than a mumble before she finishes her sentence. “But it also means nobody but me will be able to get out.”

His whole body feels as though it has been dunked in ice, all joy and pleasure evaporating as the meaning of her words wash over him.

A cage. She’d put him in a bloody _cage_.

“Trust me? Please,” Swan pleads, his anger fading away her tone. Instead, he swallows, hard, tongue flicking out to wet dry lips. Trust has never been the issue, not really, but how can he find the words to explain when he struggles to understand it himself? Mouth opens, sound refusing to come out as Killian swallows a few more times, jaw desperately working, trying to force out some sound. Voice is raspy when it finally comes, harsher than he has intended but it's the best he can manage.

“Fine. I’ll trust you.”

\--

There is little to do in the cage she has built him. The large bed he has spent many a night in is within reach but like any bed on his own, it is useless. He cannot sleep without Emma so what is the point of it. A brief exploration reveals to him the new limits she has set upon him. He can move freely in the bedroom, part of the hallway and the bathroom next door but no further. Smile is cynical, without merriment as he notes how considerate she has been in her apparently spontaneous action. To include the means by which he might relieve himself in while in a prison cell. She is a better jailer than many he has had over his long life, and this is a better goal than many he has been thrown into.

His thoughts are unfair, some part of him knows this. He had given his trust after all and with it, he had accepted this, could have told her no. She only did this to protect him in case any of the townsfolk came by while she was... out. Coming to blows with his old allies is not something he is looking forward to. He’s fought David enough times already. Won most of them, his hand tingling for a moment with the phantom pain of landing a solid hit against the Princes jaw. No need to ruffle feathers by taking part in another punch up, this is for the best. Really.

The small sinister voice is ignored, the one that whispers in the back of his mind, that she had done this without checking. What was the saying Henry had told him once? Better to ask forgiveness than permission. He could have said no. She would probably have kept the magic up in place regardless - he isn’t ready to test that theory.

Perhaps he can find a better use for this time, rather than stewing in his own thoughts and going down dark paths he has no desire in treading. The bookcase he has noticed in the past is still there, the ship still sails on its shelf. Stepping closer, he can see that his earlier guess was correct - it is a perfectly recreated model of his own beloved ship. The sight of it calms him somewhat, he can close his eyes and almost feel himself back on the Jolly Roger, the deck creaking and tilting comfortingly under him, the waves lapping against wood. A different home, an old home, and one he loves almost as much as her. Here, he has the best of both worlds. 

It is the books that interest him more though. There might be a hint here, a clue as to the workings of her mind. Hook brushes along the spines of the books, the tip tracing some of the lettering there. Books on general magic, history. Fictional tales of pirate and romance, smile sad at the sight of them. On the whole, it seems a wholly unremarkable collection, peeks into what she does in her spare time but nothing that tells him her plans or how he can help her. It’s only on the second look over of the many titles that a small, faded tome catches his eye. A book on Excalibur. It is pushed a little further in, spine cracked and broken, the wear and tear telling him that it has been read many times before. It is the only book that has any connection to Camelot, Killian reaching out to pull it free.

He gave himself to her for the most selfish of reasons true. Because he misses her, because he loves her. Because there doesn’t seem to be a way to save her from the outside, so maybe he can find the answer here. To be able to hold and kiss her is a most delicious bonus but he cannot let it distract him from his goal. This book may be part of the key, and he spends the next few hours sat on the bed, engrossed in reading it, committing it to memory and trying to work out which pages, which passages had most caught her. Excalibur might be the answer.

“I’ve figured it out. Well, partly.” All of a sudden there is the all too familiar grey smoke and she is standing there, hands wringing together as she speaks. Emma doesn’t seem to take any notice of the book he is holding, looking away from him to stare at the door as she starts to pace, movements hurried, frantic. Five steps to the door and then back to the window. Surreptitiously, he slides the book under the pillow, not wishing to show his hand too soon and besides, her worry is his focus now. 

“I mean, it's a trick. But they don’t need to know it. And I only would have it a little while. Just until they were convinced. It would mean they would leave you alone, you wouldn’t have to remain cooped up in this room, I want you by my side Killian.” She is blabbering now, words tumbling over themselves in their haste to be said, talking party to herself. Convincing herself of something? He doesn’t understand, hand and hook lifting in a placating gesture.

“Slow down Love, you’re not making any sense.”

“If I borrow.... If they think you had no choice Killian. They already think I’m evil incarnate, what’s one more crime if it means we can have some peace?” She steps close, eyes wide and pleading, leaning down to brush her hand over his chest. His own eyes widen in response, her meaning clear at last, breath catching in his throat.

His heart. She wants to take his heart.

\--

He wonders how they reached this moment.

(No he doesn't. He knows she is too good, too pure, even as the dark one she is still the saviour. She will try and save everyone, give people happy endings, make her family hate her more in the hope they don't hate him. She will sacrifice herself once again. And he knows he is too weak, too lost not to follow her, not to give up everything for her. He has crossed realms to find her, followed her through time so she wouldn't be alone. He will always give her everything, right down to himself. It is the best and worst of them coming together in one tragic, fucked up cocktail.

The knowing of it doesn't make it easier. Doesn't change the outcome. He knows this even as he struggles to know this.)

“You can't borrow it Swan.” His hand finds her own, curling around it carefully. The moment is tense, pregnant with meaning and he knows how easily this can all crumble around them. Some part of Killian is amazed that she doesn’t pull away from him, doesn’t take his apparent rejection and run. Slowly, he presses her hand tighter against his chest, watching as her fingers press over where his heart beats away. His own fingers, still heavily covered in rings rest over her delicate ones, keeping her hand in place. Smile is weak, but he holds it as he lets his eyes travel upwards to her own and meets her guarded gaze, hoping she will understand. Hoping she will realise what this moment is. “Can’t borrow what is already yours.”

“You... you mean...?” Green eyes are blown wide in shock, in awe and Killian hopes, love. He can tell she didn’t expect him to agree, can see the walls she had been building in preparation for him pulling away wobble and buckle. 

“Aye love.” This is stupid, beyond stupid, beyond reckless. She is the Dark One and here he sits, willingly offering up his literal heart to her. But she is Emma Swan, and she has owned his heart for longer than he thinks she realises. The Dark One cannot be trusted but he trusts her. He trusts them, trusts her to keep it safe even as he doesn’t believe she can fix them. There has never been a moment he didn’t trust her.

“You have my heart.”


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who commented, left kudos and read the first part, it meant the world to me and I think inspired the muses to run away with this next chapter and make it far longer than I had planned. I hope you all enjoy it. All mistakes are still my own.
> 
> Title and poem extracts as always are taken from a translation of Sonnet xvii (i do not love you...) by Pablo Neruda.

## 

** Chapter Two **

####  _**I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,  
in secret, between the shadow and the soul. - Pablo Neruda**_

__  
It is so red.

Killian doesn’t know why that surprises him so much.

His heart has been out of his chest before. He has even been in this position before, helpless before a Dark One while they held his heart. He has seen his heart before and it was red then too, small specks of blackness, of his past lurking in its depths true, but ruby red nevertheless. Somehow, for some reason, his heart glows rich and bright. There are flecks of dark still floating through it and he tries to remember the last time, trying to work out if there is more or less blackness. It is easier to focus on the small details, to let his focus center on something tiny and perhaps meaningless, because otherwise he would have to think about the fact his heart is out of his chest and held by a woman that could - if she wished - crush it.

She will not crush it. He knows this, all the way down to his bones, knows no matter what has happened, what she has become, she will not hurt him. He believes it, it is one of the reasons why he agreed to this in the first place, but there is a difference between knowing something instinctively and the reality of what is happening - that the Dark One holds his life in their hands once more. So he breathes and stares at his heart and tries to focus on the more mundane, to keep his sanity intact.

Is his heart blacker now? 

In all honesty, he can’t tell. The spots of black flicker in time to the beat of his heart, swirling around and around. They shimmer and seem to press against the red, a constant tug and ebb. The tides of his conscience coming and going. If his soul is the sea, then perhaps he has been wrong all this time in thinking Emma merely the sun. She is the moon as well, both heavenly orbs, both pulling and pushing in different measures on the tide that is his soul. Both sides of her laying claim and he is only a sailor. All he can do is let the sky guide him, lead him. In such context, her hair changing from spun gold sunshine to moonbeams is perhaps less surprising. 

(He thinks perhaps all this red in his heart is an illusion. After all, it should be black all the way through, diseased, rotten to its miserable core. Captain Hook has done so much evil in his long life, has killed without thought or memory. Nobody was an innocent if they stood between him and his revenge. Nobody was deemed worthy enough to be forgiven. Even his own father... his heart should be jet black for that crime alone. Love cannot redeem or guarantee happy endings. Just because he wants to be good now, doesn’t change the fact that he wasn’t good then.

Killian knows he deserves to be punished for everything he has done. How can he weigh how he tries to behave now against all the sins of his long life? Who speaks for them now he plays hero? All the heroics in the world shouldn't silence their justified condemnations. 

It isn't fair on his victims.)

“Is this ok?” she asks, voice small, unsure. He doesn't answer, can't answer, can't even look away from his heart that carries on pulsing softly, evenly, unaware of the storm that rages around it. It is almost hypnotising, watching his own life beat away, waiting for a feather to weigh it on the scales of truth. Nothing else seems to matter in this moment, too transfixed by the sight in front of him.

Voice cracks, somehow becoming softer, weaker as she whispers, “Killian, look at me.”

He looks. Of course he does. Head moves without thought, obeying the order in her words to meet her gaze and he can see the moment it all falls into place. The way her expression breaks as much as her voice, the way her lips crumple downwards into a small o shape before eyebrows are drawn together, frowning. 

“This... this is a bad idea.”

“Aye love,” he agrees softly and when it came to bad ideas, this has to be one of the worse. This could be the road to hell after all, and he knows a slippery slope when he sees one. This is a small step, and it will be so easy to carry on this path, to carry on making bad choices and saying there was a good reason. To use each other as excuses as the world burned around them. 

They will just have to be more than careful. She has already taken the heart and he can't save her if she pulls away again. His hand curls around hers, both holding his heart, standing together. They sway slightly, as if in time to the beats, tucked close.

“I'm breaking a promise,” she whispers, voice so low he can barely hear her. He tenses slightly, mind racing, racking his brains to try and work out what promise she is talking about. And what exactly she is breaking. That she wouldn't go dark? That she wouldn't take a heart? This moment is heavy in its possibilities.

“I’m breaking a promise to _you_ ,” Emma clarifies after a few beats of his heart, organ still pulsing away under their touch. She looks down for a moment before peeking up through lashes at him. A promise to him means a promise he has forgotten, but he can see in her eyes that it was an important promise, so important that she cares about it, despite him having no memory of it. Tongue flicks out to wet his lips as Killian tries to work out what to say. He doesn't know what the promise actually is and Emma doesn't seem to be in any mood to share, he can see she is barely holding it together, one wrong word away from zapping him out of the house. From pushing him away to protect herself and he has made his choice, he will stand by her side to the end if she lets him. 

She has always been his choice and always will be. He wonders how long it will take before she believes that.

“We are in this together Swan. We make a mistake, together. We are gonna fix this together remember?” His words are low, intent, and he wishes he could express how much he meant every one of them. All he can do is hope she can read him as well as she normally can, that she can see he forgives this one transgression. Killian lifts his hool, carefully using the tip to brush a stray lock of silver hair from her forehead. The contact makes her shiver, eyelids fluttering close. “Just put your faith in us.”

“Together,” she agrees, voice low, breathless, and he smiles. They can build something with that.

\--

As plans go, it is a fairly simple one. Break into the library. Remove a couple of the books they are using. Get caught on his way out. Try and escape. Let Emma swoop in to save him and reveal his heart is no longer in his chest. Both of them escape. The town think he is cursed and leave them alone. Job done.

(And then what? They get to live happily ever after?)

She comes up with most of the details and, as always, he is happy enough to follow her lead. The library makes sense as a target, it will be empty at night so he doesn't have to worry about bumping into anyone before he wants to. It houses various things they have used and plan to use in their quest to save her from herself so it makes sense that there is something in there that she might want. A weakness or at least, the idea of one that they can make believable. If it works, then the rest of the town will be chasing shadows for days, looking for a connection, for a reason why she was willing to send Killian to steal them out of everything they have.

He tells himself that it is for the best that they are distracted. It means that Emma will be able to relax. Perhaps she will drop her guard a little around him, enough that he can learn a little of what she is actually planning.

Something stirs in the back of his mind, a faint fear that he has ignored for so long. What if there is nothing left of his woman? If she really is all Dark and she plans great evil. The crocodile murdered his wife, a woman he must have once loved. Regina crushed the heart of her own father to punish Snow White, a vendetta that was born because she didn’t keep a single secret. He killed for equally petty reasons, killed in cruel ways just because he could, because he needed to know he was in control, because someone called him a name. Because he needed to know that he was feared. His rings weigh heavily against him, chains of his own making. Killian will do anything to keep Emma from wearing ones of her own.

Can he really stand beside her and watch as she destroys her life, destroys those she loves if that turns out to be what she plans? What is he to do if she plans to set the whole world alight just to watch it burn?

(He will light the fire himself of course, so she doesn’t have to.)

No, no, no, she cannot have something so murderously dark planned. Not his Emma. He believes she is acting from good motives, good intentions. Misguided, stubborn, isolated intentions too but he will learn the truth, as soon as they get the rest of the town off their backs.

The best thing about planning to rob the library however, is that security will light enough that he will be able take what they need without any real effort on his part but guarded enough that David or someone will be alerted. All he has to do is play the part and let them catch him in the act. Part of Killian bristles a little at that, that he has to be bad at this. Not too bad of course, not bad enough that they work out they are being played but still. He has to actively be bad at doing the only thing he thinks he has ever been good at. It will be hard, to go against the grain of what he is, as hard as the day he turned his ship around on the possibility that he could actually be a part of something once more. If he can put aside his desire to skin a crocodile, if he can put aside his desire to save his own skin simply because Emma offered him a chance at an ill defined ‘something’ then he can push aside his own pride to allow himself to be caught stealing because Emma wants it.

Thoughts of having to be different remind him of the other part of the plan. The part, she has yet to mention. There is some measure of torture in the fact he is the one that has to bring it up, a topic he wishes he could ignore. Hand drifts up to rub at the spot behind his ear, trying to work out the best way to say what needs to be said. In the end, he decides to just be blunt, to the point. Rip the words out in the hope they won’t hurt as much.

“For this to work, you uh... you have to order me Swan. You have to use my heart for real.”

“What?” her tone is incredulous, expression mirroring it as she stares across the table at him. “It's not enough that you just go and do it? I mean, you know the plan, you want to do it don't you?” Frustration tints her words and he wonders when he got so good at hearing the subtle shifts in her voice. When she first appeared as the Dark Swan, all his experience of her had been for nothing, there had been moments when he stood in front of her and a stranger looks back. Killian has always prided himself on being a quick learner however, throwing himself into this task, to learning this new Emma and reconciling her to the old. Reading her face was easier when she forgot to wear her mask, when she was an open book but her tones have always been harder. With the old Emma, he so often didn’t listen to her tone at all. It said the opposite of her face, the opposite of her words sometimes. It lied in a way, pushed him away as she fought to deny whatever was growing between them. 

She doesn't want to give the order he can tell, doesn't want to take his control away and Killian feels a little rush of relief at that. It is another little thing he can add to the list he stores in his head. The one he blames Snow White for, because it is full of hope and love and sicky sweet feelings. The one he internally calls proof that the other Emma is still there. She doesn’t want to use his heart but it doesn’t change the fact that she needs to, that this is the whole point after all. He thinks he loves her all the more for how bad she sometimes is, at being dark.

This is his life apparently. Willingly in bed with the Dark One, heartless and having to plead, to beg, that she use his heart against him, use his heart to betray people he might have once cared for. 

“It needs to be real. Regina knows how this works, probably better than anyone else. Use my heart love.”

\--

Two books. The objectives of his thievery tonight is two books. She waves a hand as she tells him, casually dismissing them as unimportant. That they only needed to look important, that is all part of the trick.

Both books are about Merlin, but only one about Excalibur. He’s no fool. It’s possible of course, that she might have picked them at random but the Dark One never did anything without having two purposes in their mind. If she wants these books - and she told him the titles, told him those instead of merely any books about Camelot - then she wants them for a reason. She wants one for a reason, mind flashing to the book she already owns about Excalibur, how he had oh so carefully pushed it back into place. The next morning, when he woke from his enchanted sleep, the book was gone. 

It hurts a little, a sting that is muted by his lack of heart, to know that she still cannot bring herself to trust him in the final reckoning. How can he save her, how can she claim to fix this, when she insists on going alone? It is, he thinks, perhaps her greatest weakness. Worse than any love she might feel, the way in which she pulls away in a misguided attempt to protect everyone. Her own mess, so she will clean it up herself, thinking it makes her strong instead of weak. He doesn’t say anything even though he knows, logically, he should call her out on it. This is a slow process, getting her to let him in has always been a slow thing and Killian is nothing if not a patient man. He will rebuild the trust between them tiny piece by tiny piece. 

Which is why he finds himself standing in the darkened lobby of the library, the two stolen books stored carefully in his satchel. Part one complete and it had almost been embarrassing, how easy it had been to force the lock on the entrance and slip inside, stride swift and intentful. He weaves artfully between the stacks, searching by the dim light. It doesn’t take long to find the books Emma mentions and slip them into his arms. Now he finds his job is complete and the town is still bathed in silence, in peace.

When this is all over, he is going to have to talk to Belle, get her to upgrade her security here. Anyone could have broken in.

(Best case, when this is all over, Emma alone might be able to still look at him. When she is saved. He knows they cannot go back to how they used to be, that the steps he has taken means she could never forgive him, not when she was in her right mind. Emma, at least, has the excuse of being possessed, influenced by something so much more powerful. He has nothing to fall back on like that, and they have always questioned his motives. They will never see this for love, the world was too black and white in their eyes, love is good, hate is bad. There is so much they miss in the possibilities. Regina, alone might understand. She knows how dark love can grow, but Killian does not expect her to fight in his corner, to explain to the rest, even if she gets it.

When this is over, he expects to see scowls, hatred, the back of people’s heads as they avoid him. When this is over he thinks David well threaten him to stay away from his family once more. When this is over, he knows he is owed more than a few slaps and punches.)

The clock on the counter ticks softly, counting seconds. Minutes pass and still Killian stands in the dark lobby, an equally dark expression on his face. He is unable to leave the building until someone investigates just as they planned, just as Emma reluctantly ordered but how is he supposed to make this look natural when he is just standing waiting to be caught red handed? Either he is still too good at this, even when trying to be bad or David is really off his game at the moment. His ego is healthy most of the time but he has to admit, it is more likely to be the latter, the man has reason enough to be distracted.

Thumb brushes idly against his lips as he thinks, trying to work out what to do. He cannot stand here so suspiciously. Perhaps he should return to the stacks, pretend he is still looking for a different book. Going deeper into the library holds little appeal to him however, takes him further and further away from his escape point and it makes him run the risk that he might be caught before his time. She will come and save him wherever he is, but the library has been the scene of too many of his defeats to wish to add to another.

The counter then. He can hide behind it while he tries to plan out his next move. It feels good to have a plan, even if it only is for a few moments in advance. He has spent so much of his life with some plan or another that he feels rudderless without it. Another reason why he had been so insistent that she command him. Fingers brush over the counter top in silent greeting as he walks around it, remembering all the times that he has seen Belle standing there, hard at work on something or other.

Slowly, he slides down the back of the counter, head tilting back to stare blindly up towards the ceiling. Once upon a time, he has sat in this same position. It was a different place, a different counter but there is much that is similar. He had been ordered by another then too. Had betrayed people then, people who hadn’t deserved what he had done to them. 

A wave of regret, of grief, raises up in him, crashing towards the ice that edges his shore. 

\--

All he is truly aware of, is his own breathing. In, out. In, out. Time must pass but he is lost in the sea of his own mind, thoughts turned inward. Memories threaten to overwhelm him, drifting from one crime to another. He has lost count of the broken hearted people he sees in his mind, people he betrayed, the pain he has caused. He is adrift. A creak from the front door draws his attention back to himself, eyes blinking rapidly as he wills away the sudden wetness there, blurring his vision. Breath catches in his throat, hardly daring to move for fear of making a sound. Footsteps sound from the other side of the counter, a few steps in and then a pause. Whoever is on the other side of the counter is clearly trying to decide what to make of this, Killian biting at his bottom lip as he worries. There is so much that can still go wrong here. Hell, they could go to the counter which has the magic box, which has the talking phone and he is an idiot, because the phone is the most logical place to go, get help and then they will see him daydreaming and not crying behind the counter like an idiot. 

Floor creaks as the person moves at last, heading away from the counter and towards the main room of the library. Slowly, Killian inches upwards, peeking over the top of the counter just in time to see the back of David as he moves into the other room. He has no idea which God is smiling on him so that he isn’t noticed but right now, he doesn’t care. Time to lead David on a merry chase. Killian hopes that the other man has had the sense to contact someone, that he hasn’t gone into what could have been a trap alone. Hopefully before he even entered the building. Carefully, he eases out from behind the counter, a darker shadow in the barely lit room. Leather was always good for sulking in the shadows, one of the many reasons he had favoured it. It was armour of his own, kept him safe and now he only has a jacket of it. Fingers twitch, the urge to reach for his weapon strong. Even though he doesn’t have a weapon in this world, and he doesn’t want to fight, he can’t help but feel so exposed. So little leather, no sword, he is helpless. He feels helpless, hand clenching into a fist, trying to will such negative feelings away. This is no time for self pity. This is time for action, for the plan.

Elbow catches at a stack of books on the edge of the counter, Killian putting extra pressure on them. The crash sounds extra loud in the near empty room, and he bites down a smile at it. Good enough for an accident. Without looking, he darts for the door, pulling it open roughly, hearing the other man start. Good. Main street is deserted as he runs to the left, ducking down one of the alleys. He makes a small loop, heading back to the main road of the town, the nice open space seems as though it would make for a good confrontation. The street is as deserted as the first time he was on it, the sight making him frown. Bloody hell, he couldn’t have lost the Prince already, surely? 

“Hook! Stop!” Ah. There he is, voice close behind him.

He swallows down the relief and keeps running. 

\--

Even though he is expecting it, it is still a surprise to see the heroes coming round a corner to try and block his escape. There is something undeniably dramatic about it, almost as though they had waited for each other so they stride into view together in one pose. Regina, with Snow and Robin flanked on either side of her. No Henry strangely, although Killian can’t help but wonder who is looking after him right now. He hopes Henry isn't alone, as much as he might be capable of looking after himself, he hopes they have not left him to his own devices.

(He is glad the lad isn’t here. Killian doesn't want him to witness his humiliation, or his mothers apparent betrayal. Far better to hear it sugar coated by a family member, where words and distance will make it easier to swallow. This way, he couldn't pick up on any tiny mistakes they might make.

Henry might not have believed it even if he saw it with his own eyes. The heart of the truest believer was always going to be the one they would struggle to convince. It was the one that would surely have hurt the most as well.)

“Nowhere to run Hook,” Regina tells him, tone haughty and there are moments like this, that he is reminded of just how much of a Queen she truly was. He can hear David over his shoulder coming to a stop and panting slightly as he catches his breath. Great. Trapped between two groups and if he goes for one of the side streets, he might find an arrow or worse in him. Or he might get away and that would just ruin everything.

“Having a party without me?” Swan’s voice is dry, almost emotionless as it cuts through the stand off, coming from somewhere further along the street behind him and no doubt David. Smoke coils around an empty space next to Snow and the next second her husband is standing there. He adopts a smug smile he most certainly doesn't feel, lifting an eyebrow in their direction. 

“Well, it's been fun,” he tells them, making sure his voice is his best ‘arrogant Captain Hook’.

With a dramatic bow and flourish of his hand, he spins tightly on the spot, twirling round as if in a dance to face his Swan. She is dressed the same as she has been these past weeks, hair as silver as ever, red lips drawing his attention. There is a hunger in the pit of his stomach, imagining her kisses, something dark and dangerous that demands to be answered, something he promises later, once this is done, something different to his usual feelings. Briskly, he paces towards her.

“Killian, stop.” He stops. He still can’t help it, he can’t see his heart but her hands are behind her back and he knows her fingers are coiled around him. He supposes he should feel some degree of fear in this moment, a faint worry that she might go too far in her play acting but he feels nothing of the sort. There is still a good ten feet between them, and he wants so badly to cross that gap. Instead, he is rooted to the spot between Emma and her parents, neither one thing or the other. He wants to go to her, he wants to stand next to her while they do this in the hope that his proximity might give her the strength she needs. As always though, his Swan seems determined to do it alone and all he can give her is his gaze, eyes fixed on her face.

“I see you’ve got him all trained, with your ‘fetch' and ‘stay'. What's next, ‘roll over’? Or how about... ‘play dead’.” Regina's voice hardens on those final words, threat implicit and it is all Killian can do not to roll his eyes at it. Ever the drama queen that one. If he had the ability to turn around, he knows she would still have that artful sneer on her features, a glint of anger in eyes. Robin is no doubt standing there with his bow aimed right at Emma, as though an arrow is any kind of threat to her.

“Oh he can do tricks Regina. Would you like to see one?” One of her hands moves from behind her back, drifting upwards in the air so all can see the glowing organ she holds. Automatically, his eyes lift to follow it, glued to the sight of his heart. There is a number of sharp intakes of breath, a collective gasp from behind him as they take in what she is showing them.

“Emma...” It is the Lady Snow who speaks first, a single word that is so heavy with pain, with disbelief as she looks at her daughter. 

Killian can hear the judgement that is woven into the word. It makes him ache, and he can only imagine how it must be affecting his Swan, for all that she struggles to hold her mask in place, to act as if she cannot even hear her mother. He forces his eyes back to her face once more, trying to ignore his heart in order to focus on his love. A tiny smile twitches on his face after a few seconds of silence, trying to offer what encouragement he can. This plan feels worse all the time but they have come too far now to turn back. She stares back at him, the pair balanced on the knife edge as he wills her to do what needs to be done, even if it feels so very wrong. He can see the moment she forces herself to harden once more, eyes darkening as she lifts her free hand to the one which holds him close. Finger brushes against his heart, pressure strong enough he can feel it although it isn’t hard enough to cause pain.

He’s had people hold his heart before to control him. He’s had them squeeze, the pain knocking him to his knees and making him feel every second of the slow and agonizing death it promises. He’s never had anyone caress his heart before. Until this moment, Killian hadn’t thought it was even possible. A strangled gasp slips from his lips, as she runs another finger along it, stroking him and he is glad he is standing with his back to the rest of them. It means they can’t see the way his cheeks tint red, each shuddering breath catching in his throat. There is a devious look in her eyes as she lowers her hand to her face, before brushing her lips against him. Gods alive, she is kissing his heart, red mouth moving over it.

Fingers twitch erratically, and he is on fire from all the sensations that are assaulting him. Every thought flees his mind and there is nothing in the world, nothing in the universe but her. Tongue flicks out, wetting dry lips as he imagines everything he wants to do to her, everything he would if only he could touch her. He has to touch her, he is burning up with the need to run his fingers over her skin, to kiss her. He needs to worship her, fall to his knees in front of her and offer her the world. He will kill for her, kill anyone she asks, he will gut them with his hook and make them dance on the end of it. Emotion bursts wild in his chest and he loves her, he loves her so much, he will do anything for her and he has to protect her, he has to protect her, he is drowning in how much he needs her.

A sudden pressure on his left arm jolts him back to reality, eyes darting to that side. He has all but forgotten the presence of anyone else, eyebrows drawing together in confusion at the sight of Robin standing there. There is a worried expression on his face, and it takes Killian a few seconds to work through his lust muddled thoughts to even work out why. With the why comes the rest of reality and he can breathe again, drawing in great lungfuls of air. Every inch of him trembles, limbs feel weak as though he has spent a whole night at the wheel of the Jolly Roger in the midst of a storm. 

(She used his heart. She _used_ his heart.)

The archer opens his mouth to speak but before he can form so much as a syllable Emma is lifting him in the air and flicking him away with force.

\--

She looks, he thinks distantly, like some avenging goddess.

Or a beautiful angel of death if threatened, and apparently that extends to thieves touching his arm in worry and breaking the spell. A copper tang invades his mouth, Killian tasting blood on his lip from where he has apparently bitten himself. He can't turn around. He can't move, he can't show his concern and see if Robin is alright because she has told him to be still. All he can do is strain his ears and try and work out what is happening behind him. At least Emma has stopped playing with his heart so he can focus on something other than her. On the other hand, she has actually stopped distracting him and it means all he can focus on is the sick thud Robin had made when he collided with whatever had stopped his flight.

Over and over, he hears that noise, a new rhythm to accompany his nightmares. Then, after what feels like an age - but could only be a minute at most surely - he hears Robin and it sounds like music to his old pirates ears. Eyes close for a moment in relief, shoulders sagging. He's talking. He’s talking and he’s trying to calm Regina down, a soft and steady stream of words assuring her that he is unharmed. Killian isn’t sure it is the total truth, he knows if he has been the one in Robin's position he would have shrugged off any amount of discomfort to try and spare Swan some pain but if the other man can talk then he can't be too badly hurt. He hopes.

Emma still stands there, one hand outstretched in the pushing motion she had used to force Robin away, a living statue now. There is a glint of something in her eyes, and Killian is standing too far away to be able to read exactly what it is. 

Is it foolish to hope it is regret for having gone further than they had intended? They hadn't planned for either of the events of the last few minutes, this was supposed to be done by now.

“Perhaps I haven't made myself clear... nobody touches my pirate.” 

Her hand drops, as she very deliberately brushes it against her leather jacket, wiping away imaginary filth as if she had actually touched Robin and become dirty as a result. She seems to have regained her composer in the past few seconds, gaze almost bored as she scans the group behind him.

“Touch him again in any way and I won't be as nice,” she warns. Her eyes rake over them for a few seconds longer before she appears to dismiss them, attention returning to Killian.

It is Emma of course that finally closes the distance between them, stalking towards him. Her gaze is hungry, while he only feels sick to the pit of his stomach, willing desperately for this facade to end. He is worn out, wrung empty by her tricks and Killian feels as if the only reason he is still standing is thanks to her magic. The games aren't over yet it seems. She still holds his heart, as though her power over him wasn't absolute before. There is another dance still to do, Emma stopping in front of him. His taller frame mostly bocks her from the view of her parents, as though they can pretend they are alone in this moment as they finish the plan. Out of the two of them, he honestly can't tell who needs the illusion of privacy more, Emma as she plays the Dark Swan up to the hilt or him, as he waits for her orders and knowing he will obey like her slave.

“Tell them you belong to me,” Emma orders, words brisk and her tone sharp.

He feels a smirk curl onto his features that is not his own, something false and brittle, all sharp edges and jagged ends. It’s a wonder it doesn’t crack right off his face as he lifts a hand to cup her cheek, thumb brushing soft and tiny circles against her skin. A tender and soft motion that sits at odds with his expression.

“I belong to you, always,” Killian assures her. It is nothing but the honest truth, and so he wonders why they sound so hollow to his own ears. Apparently, not only his own, Emma frowning slightly as she stares up at him, features thrown into sharp contrasts by the play of light and shadow across her.

“Kiss me.” 

He does.

The kiss tastes like ashes in his mouth.

\--

“They bought it! I can't believe they actually bought it!” His Swan paces as she talks, normally pale cheeks flushed, hands lifting and dropping with nervous energy. They stand in her living room, Killian lounging against the wall as he watches her through hooded eyes. Trying, as always to work out what she is thinking, what is going on now in her head, to put her first and he can deal with his own feelings later.

This is not Emma in victory he realises. This is Emma spiraling out of control, this is her in defeat and pain.

As much as this was her plan, as much as she wanted it to work, wanted them to believe she would do such a thing, he realises she also didn’t want it to actually work. Some part of her had wanted her parents to believe in her despite what she did. Wanted them to fight for her, to find their little girl under all that blackness. That’s what they did after all. It's what they claimed they did. Instead they had stood there in stunned silence and let the pair of them walk away after their kiss.

“They really think I'm evil, don't they, they are bound to give up on me after this.” Hands twist nervously together as she speaks, and he should have known this is how it would play out, that she would be the one to suffer.

Killian doesn't believe this is the end. Snow tried time and time again to redeem Regina, had forgiven her even after she tried to kill her - and then forgiven her again when she attempted yet again to murder her. She had forgiven her for the dark curse which cost her twenty-eight years without her husband. The same curse which had taken her daughter away from her and caused her to lose being with Emma while she grew up. His Swan temporarily having physical possession of someone else's heart will deter her for a little while only and he hopes it is long enough to get through to the woman he loves.

“How long before even Henry abandons me? Like everyone else.”

She is falling, slipping further and further away. Losing herself and it feels like it is his fault somehow. As if he has driven her to these extremes. He doesn't know how to reach her, how to prove himself to her, but having no plan has never stopped Killian Jones before. So he steps forward, hand outstretched even as she turns away to pace restlessly towards the door.

“I didn't abandon you.”

(For a split second the words taste painfully familiar in his mouth. As if they have been in this place before, another time, another life, and he is standing in the middle of some strange darkened field, staring at her with unfamiliar emotions aimed at her rolling around in his mind. Betrayal. Pain. Confusion. Disappointment. Anger. Hate. Hate, hate, so much hate and how dare she do this to him, how dare she ch-

A dizzying sense of vertigo assaults his senses, stomach churning, before he blinks and the sensation, the imagery and feelings are gone. Memory of it fades as fast as the initial flash, leaving him standing there and wondering what he had just been thinking about.)

It was, it seemed, possibly the worst thing he could have said. Her head snaps around to look at him, eyes wide with horror? Why, horror? He had wanted to reassure her, to comfort her through his own pain and instead he seems to have somehow made everything worse. Killian is at an utter loss as to why or how he can make this better as she carries on staring at him, eye boring into him, the horror fading slightly. It is replaced by an equally intense look, searching as she seems to try and stare into his very soul.

Emma draws in a deep, shuddering breath, body trembling lightly. It is the first movement she has taken since she first looked at him, the first breath he realises either of them have taken. 

And then, she pounces.

\--

His head rocks back, connecting with the wall behind him as all of a sudden she is so very there, pressed up against him, hands roaming over his body. Emma looks as though she wants to all but climb into his clothes, as if every millimeter of space between them is too much. Her breath is still jagged, painful and that is not the sort of breathless that Killian is used to causing his love. His one good hand rubs up and down her back, trying to offer wordless comfort since speaking had somehow caused this in the first place. Emma shudders, a full body shake, before pulling back a fraction, although her hands carry on dancing over him, gentle touches to seemingly reassure herself he is standing right there. She tilts her head to stare up at him, biting at her bottom lip. There is still a hint of horror, fear in her eyes although she is clearly trying to will it away. 

Between blinks, his heart is suddenly in the hand which has crept around to his front. There isn’t enough time for him to panic, for the cold to wash over him, there is barely enough time for him to even register she is holding his heart before her hand is flat against his chest, her magic slipping it back inside. 

If anything, it hurts more going back in, the shock of a bucket of ice cold sea water being dumped over his head after a rum soaked evening. A burst of emotion rolls through him, every muted thing coming through with perfect clarity. His heart is pounding in his chest once more, singing his love with every beat. Everything they have done since he lost his heart replays in his memory, every choice he - she - made, every word that had been spoken. Robin, the sound of him connecting with a building, God, Robin, he had saved him and as thanks Killian hadn’t even looked in his direction. If it hadn’t been for the thief breaking her connection then he doesn’t know what would have happened. He hopes he is okay, hopes it isn’t another thing to weigh down on the tattered remains of his soul.

And Emma. His love, his everything. She drove him wild, the memory of those kisses and unheard words against his heart making him ache in both a terrible and oh so good way. His growl is low, guttal, a match to the fire and it is all she seems to have been waiting for as she captures his lips once more.

It is nothing like the kiss from before. There is genuine hunger, passion as the melt into each other. Once again, oxygen feels unimportant, the last thing he needs to think about as he moans into her mouth. It lasts for seconds. It lasts for hours. All that matters is they are kissing and he can feel every inch of it. They break apart for air at last, a few moments before pressing against each other once more. These kisses are less heated than the first one, lacking the frantic motions but they are just as important, just as needed.

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to,” she blabs, words slipping out in between the kisses Killian presses against her. She seems desperate to talk and he is just as desperate to kiss her senseless. Tears gather in her eyes although they don’t spill, little glittering diamonds against green.“I was scared, I panicked. I didn’t. I didn’t want to lose you.”

Killian doesn’t want to hear this. He isn’t sure he can stand to hear this. He doesn’t want her to try and justify what she did because he knows he will forgive her for it.

He grips her tighter, fingers digging in and he knows they will leave marks in the morning. Bruises that will prove that he was here, that this had actually happened. Her pale skin is normally so free of any blemishes and there are times when he feels as though he doesn’t make any impression on her at all. That she can step away from him and there is nothing to prove he had been with her in any way. He needs those marks tonight, as he intents to show her just how much she isn’t going to lose him. With another growl that is mostly swallowed into her mouth, he starts to nudge them both towards the bedroom. It's hard, since neither appear willing to stop kissing or touching or pressing as close as they possibly can but then he has always been up for a challenge. The movements are hardly graceful, knocking into tables and catching against doors. He knows she could magic them both to the bed in an instant but she seems to need these clumsy moments just as he does. 

Tonight there is no Captain Hook, no Dark One or even Saviour.

Tonight they are just Killian and Emma.

\--

Killian wakes the next morning to find his heart is gone once more. 

For a moment there is a stabbing sense of betrayal, of pain, and how could she, how could she, howcouldshehowcouldshe, but that moment is fading and no matter how frantically Killian chases after it, tries to holds onto it, the emotion slip through his fingers like so much rum pouring from a flask. Everything he felt in those hours when his heart had beat fiercely in his chest, all the fiery emotions, they are fading into muted memory. Killian can still remember them of course, can bring to mind the moment he first kissed her with his heart, the way he had used both hand and hook to slip her jacket off, letting it glide from her arms in one smooth motion. He can remember thinking he felt happy, thinking he felt joy, thinking he felt relief that she had never cared about his hook. He does not feel any of those things now.

He does have aches in all the right places from their activities of the night before, a tired pull of muscle that would normally have brought a smug and satisfied smile to his face at knowing he has pleased and been pleased to such an extend. He aches in all the wrong places too. Killian lifts a hand to rub it roughly over his face, trying to kick his numb brain into some kind of action. He doesn’t understand. Why would she return it only to take it again without his knowledge? He had agreed to this already, had trusted her. He hadn’t even asked for it back last night, that had been all her own choice and he just doesn’t understand _why_.

Carefully he pushes himself upright, rolling over as he did to lean on his good arm as he scans the room. As if the layout of this bedroom will somehow answer the question that is rattling around and around his brain, as if he can look at his discarded clothes and the truth will be there in a half rolled up sock.

Emma is suddenly standing in the doorway, appearing there without any sound, although he is sure she walked instead of using her magic. Hips sway proactively as he sways towards him, an invitation Killian would normally have made some suggestive comment at that, would have tried to tempt her to bed or at least for a kiss but right now all he can do is watch as she comes ever closer. Her own eyes are hooded, gaze guarded as she perches herself dainty on the edge of the bed next to him. Fingers lift to his face, tracing against his lips and although she smiles, there is still that hesitation there, an unspoken question as she looks at him.

She doesn’t know he knows. Killian wants to laugh at that, something smooth, amused. The new Dark One is so young still, so unsure of herself and what she can actually do. What power she actually possess, and how much she can actually do. He supposes it's not that much of a surprise. The only experience she is drawing on is Aurora and she didn’t know her heart had been missing, had woken in sleep and then fled without thinking about it. By the time she could have realised, Cora had her heart and thus the princess firmly under her control. There are plenty of people who had never realised their heart was missing until it was too late. Some, he suspects who lived their whole lives and died without ever knowing that they were missing a part of them. 

“Killian?” Her voice makes his name sound like a question, and he can’t help the shiver that runs through him, a shiver he hopes she will blame on the way her fingers dance from his lips to instead run down his throat, teasing at sensitive skin there. “Do you feel alright?”

“I’m fine love, a bit tired,” Killian swallows heavily as he speaks, the movement making her smile grow a little more naturel, a little more wicked as if she believes her touch is the sole reason for his reaction. He needs to answer, he can feel the compulsion demanding he tell her, answer her but everything is still so new and he doesn’t know how she will react when she realises he knows the truth. He scrambles wildly in his mind for something he can say that will answer her question without giving himself away, something that she will believe. “I’m used to feeling like this, don’t worry.”

(She doesn’t give him his heart back.

He doesn’t ask for it.)

\--

There is something about the basement that still calls to him, something that she still doesn't want him to get to. She makes him promise, the first day, that he won't look, tells him that this is his home now too, that he can go where he likes and if he wants something then he only has to ask for it - but stay out of the basement that has the answers to all the questions still driving him insane.

Normally, being told not to do something is a sure fire way to make sure he does it. The rebel in him that had been born out of pain and betrayal. It is a weakness, he knows, it lets people play him but he cannot help it. He smirks and he nods and then the moment he has the chance, he goes right ahead and does it without any regrets. After all, as he is so fond of saying, pirate! 

It was not so long ago he was standing in Grannys, commiserating with Robin about their complicated lives, squinting at a picture from inside Zelena and talking of that door he was not supposed to enter. A door that calls to him, almost sings to him, the compulsion was that strong. The urge is still there, muted but ever present, a restless little thing that makes his leg dance when he tries to sit still, makes him tap his hook against any flat surface he might find himself leaning against if he tries to stand.

His head feels as if it wants to explode the longer he thinks about the basement. Killian wonders if that is anything to do with the promise he made not to go near it.

(It isn’t a promise. It’s an order and she has been so very careful with her words since she stole his heart. Manipulation worthy of a Dark One, she never tells him to do something but wraps it up in his own choice instead or suggests courses of action if he wants to take it. They are all of them, orders.)

So, he tries his best not to go near it. Tries not to think about it and when Emma is with him, that is easy enough to do. She has always demanded his full attention, something that has only increased since gaining dark magic. It is when he is alone that the trouble starts, his mind as restless as his body, thoughts twisting and turning, coiling back on themselves like a giant snake. He needs to occupy his thoughts, distract himself but it is a vicious cycle, headache meaning he can't focus on anything else and not focusing means his headache grows worse. 

\--

A knock at the door shakes him from his morbid thoughts that so often accompany him when he is alone.

For a moment he remains in the chair, hardly daring to breathe, and even his leg has stilled. After the fight in the street he has only seen glimpses of the others, the flash of hair, the coat on their backs as they vanish into doorways or along streets that he does not - will not - follow them down. They have not exchanged a single word and they have certainly not tried to seek him out. Part of him misses them, a part that he strives to ignore. Perhaps he misses them more than he realizes, misses them enough to imagine a knock.

It sounds again. Echoing throughout the open spaces in her living room, a strong beat to make up for the one that no longer sounds in his chest. Carefully, Killian moves towards the front door, fingers brushing over the hilt of the sword that sits in the umbrella stand of all things. 

Another gift from Emma, the admission spilling out in the dark of night, whispered against the skin of her throat. Of how he felt somehow like less of himself, that he felt like everything he was was being unmade. Many of the changes are ones he welcomes, desires. There is little of that villain he used to be that Killian wishes to keep, but a sword is strangely one of them. The next morning he had woken alone, a sword with a bright red bow lying on the chair in the living room.

Practicing his sword fighting is something to do, and he keeps making a mental note to get a proper belt that he can attach it to. Later, later, there is still the door to answer, Killian pulling it open, before blinking in surprise at the person on the other side.

Well, he can't say he expected to see David, mind foundering as he tries to think of something to say.

“Emma's not here, can I help you?” _Ridiculous_ , part of his mind thinks, _utterly ridiculous_. 

_Good form_ , the rest of him thinks back, and he may be a scoundrel but he can still show common courtesies if he wishes. Plus, it will no doubt throw David off, put him a little on the back foot and hopefully give Killian the advantage. Sword is a reassuring presence by his foot, out of sight but easy enough to reach for if he needs the added advantage. Assuming, of course, David doesn't have his gun.

“Oh, I know she isn't here. I came to talk to you.”

Alarm shot through him, instantly going tense, expression hard. Thoughts of gaining the advantage are lost, and he knows his reaction reveals too much. David might be Emma’s father and his one time friend but if something has happened and he is somehow to blame he won't be able to control himself.

“You know? Is she ok?”

“Shes fine. I just thought while she was busy, we could have a chat. Do you mind if I...” David trails off, lifting a hand to vaguely gesture towards the house behind them. Killian gives a gentle snort, forcing himself to appear to relax once more and lean against the door frame. He's careful to block the other man's entrance without making it too obvious, arms loosely folded as he watches the Prince, trying to gage what is happening and if he needs to legitimity treat his possible one time friend as an enemy. Every nerve end is screaming that he needs to get out there, needs to find her to see for himself that she is fine. But this is her father, and if he says Emma is fine, she is fine. As fine as she can be in her condition of course, but he doesn’t believe David is that good of an actor. He’s never had to lie for his life before, if something had truly happened, Killian knows it would be written on the other man's face. So Emma really is fine, no doubt being distracted by the Lady Snow and the rest while the Prince carried out this daring mission.

He should have known that David was not here because of him, Killian ruthlessly squashing down the flicker of hurt, of abandonment that wanted to fan itself alight. Instead, he lets himself focus on the matter at hand, it is easier that way.

“Do I mind if you enter and search the house while the lady of the home is absent you mean?” he asks when the silence stretches on long enough to just start to turn uncomfortable, lifting an eyebrow as he speaks. David, at least, has the good grace to look somewhat sheepish by his words, hands lifting in an attempt to placate him. 

“We need to know what my daughter is up to. If you just let me-”

“I'm afraid I can't let you do that Dave,” Killian interrupts, voice silky smooth and he would love nothing more, but Emma had given him his orders. Carefully wrapped up as a joint plan, but his heart will compel him, he knows this. He will stop his friend and he will think it is his own choice, will tell Emma it was his own choice, as the pair of them continued their dance of denial. She still doesn’t know he knows, and as much as Killian wants to tell her, he is afraid. Afraid she will think he doesn’t understand and that she will do something rash. He wants to know his heart is missing, wants to know that this is not his own choice, wants to walk through whatever this is with his eyes wide open. To be heartless is a terrible thing. It gives reason and justification to so much. It gives deniability and he could say this isn't his fault but it is and he needs to carry on knowing that.

To his surprise, his words make David stop, blinking a few times as he gives

“Did you just... was that... never mind.”

“I don’t want to have to fight you mate,” he tells David, voice tired, almost dull, lacking any other emotion. “Don't make me fight you.” It is as close to begging that Killian feels he can reach right now, begging makes him feel weak, helpless, brings his thoughts back to memories that he will not think about. He will _not_ go down those paths.

“There has to be something Hook,” David pleads, eyes burning fiercely. “If you don't want this, there must be something you can tell me that will help.”

Killian considers it. He doesn't know the ins and outs, every detail of how heart control works. His knowledge is greater than Emma's of course, but he isn't the expert. He is no crocodile. If she is looking through his heart she will see all of this. If she asks him, he will tell her truthfully what happens and even now, Killian cannot bring himself to betray her.

(He could tell them the truth. Emma had never ordered him to keep quiet, has never said he couldn't talk about what had happened. He could be open in a way it hurt her too much to be. Killian knows that Emma would need a push to share her burden with her family, something drastic to open up to more than one person. It is tempting to take this burden off her shoulder, to take the choice away from her. He could tell David everything and hope that she would forgive him in the morning.

Fear - and loyalty - keeps him quiet, fear she might get frightened. He cannot stand the thought that he might hurt her. Iconic as she has hurt him plenty over the past days, hurt him by accident and hurt him on purpose. She has his loyalty, Emma has always had it no matter how the darkness tries to twist her - and by extension him - up. Loyalty has always meant the world to Killian, no matter which version of Killian Jones he was. Lieutenant, Captain Jones, Captain Hook, plain Killian Jones, all value loyalty and he thinks all versions of himself would remain loyal to her despite the trials.)

“Oh I forgot, expert in being heartless are you? Or am I faking it? So convinced I can help if I just try hard enough, thought you lot were convinced I was just doing this because I'm a dirty pirate.” They are faking it of course. Faking the coldness and how could he have ever believed she was cold. Faking the reasons, even faking each other. One pretending she hasn't stolen his heart and the other pretending he doesn't know the truth. It is all a mess, bubbling away at him. 

“After all, I am only a villain, you a hero,” he sneers, needing to regain his footing in this strange world. 

Anger is easier to hold onto, to push out, to focus on the fact that it would be so easy to blame the rest of the town for the situation he has found himself in. A pale reflection of the anger he would be capable of feeling if his heart beat inside his chest, but anger nevertheless. He is as angry as he can be at David.

(He is angry at himself.

At all twists and turns that have led them to this moment. That he was foolish enough to think he could play the games of the dark one and not get hopeless ensnared in the process. That he is still playing the game, rolling the dice time and time again only to find he is staring at snake eyes. He is trapped in a web of his own making.

He hates that.)

Hand gropes behind him, reaching for the sword without wanting to look at it. If he looks then she might look. Is this betrayal? It comes close, comes so perilously close. They are supposed to be leading them on a false trail so he can focus on saving Emma but ever since that morning he feels as though he is in over his head. He cannot just tell them but perhaps he can nudge them back to what they're supposed to be doing so they can save her because he knows he needs the help. Emma needs more than he alone can give her.

(Killian hates that too.)

“Stop wasting my time,” he snaps, eyes still trained on a little spot just above the left of David’s shoulder. “You are focused on the wrong things mate.” As he speaks, he slaps the sheathed sword against the other man’s chest, each word accompanied by a soft tap. 

“Emma is on her way back,” he adds after a moment's hesitation, the sword pulled back and tossed behind him without a glance. Killian has no idea if she is actually coming or not, but he needs David gone, needs to get inside, find a quiet spot and try and center himself. He needs a moment to breathe and using Emma's name seems the best and quickest way to do that. It works too, David slowly backing away and heading down the garden path.

He has no idea if David got the actual message.

\--

Be careful what you wish for.

All he had wanted was David to go away, for a little bit of peace before Emma returned so he could try and gather his thoughts. He had needed to calm the storm that was his mind, to try and work out some kind of plan but he hasn't wanted the peace to last this long. A little bit of quiet gives his mind chance to think and a lot of quiet lets his thoughts turn inward, turn poisonous, torturous. 

She was avoiding him. He had once told her he was perceptive, and could tell when she was avoiding him, something she had actually agreed with. Before running away of course to avoid him once more. 

This doesn’t take a perceptive man. He has not seen her since before Davids little visit and although he knows she has returned once or twice to the house, she has always managed to time it to when he is distracted, at the opposite side of the building to where she wants to go. Instead Killian is alone once more. He moves around the rooms and tries to fill his time, to not be an intruder in someone else's home. Tries to give her the space she is demanding but it is hard when he is empty and aches for things he can no longer possess. He practises his sword fighting in the back garden, works on the steps that he knows so well but can always improve on. Every room is searched - all bar the basement of course. He takes a room at a time and goes through everything with a fine hook.

There is a bottle of squid ink behind one of the paintings downstairs.

Thoughts continue to fester.

What the hell had they said to her?

Did she know what he did?

He hadn't betrayed her, it was such a tiny thing, just a hint of a sword, a hint that they should focus on swords instead of him. They needed the help and if the heroes focused on that, then maybe they would have some new ideas Emma could use. She would understand surely? Or was he another just deciding he knew what was best for her? Making choices she didn't want because he was selfish?

No. No. Those are paths he will not tread, that way darkness lies.

Darkness has been a part of his life for so long now. He knows darkness, he knows evil, he knows spite and anger and hate. He has been intimate with darkness for longer than most people have been alive - Crocodiles notwithstanding. He knows its siren calls and Killian would be lying if he claimed not to be tempted by everything it promises. It would be so much simpler for everyone if he played devil on Emmas shoulder. He could let the darkness talk through him and trust in someone else to save them. They could be together without fear or pain or effort but he will not let the darkness win and use him and their love like that.

(He is already being used. Killian is well aware of this. Used and drained of everything he is. The darkness is using him. He is Emma's weak spot and like a fool he pranced right up into its waiting maw and offered himself up like some idiotic gift complete with a large ribbon.)

He has to do something, he has to change something because this cannot continue. The routine they have fallen into is dangerous and he is a coward. After all this time, he has finally become a coward because he isn’t facing her as he should. Killian has given her all the space that he can, but he knows with stark clarity that unless he does something, this is how it will carry on being. She will build a wall of ice around herself as surely as if she was Elsa, unless he does - something.

\--

“Swan! Emma Swan!” Desperation drives him, and he will tear this town apart if he has to in order to find her. She is his world and she cannot leave him now. He is going mad without her here.

He has no idea what drives him to the roof, why he possibly thought he would find her there. When he had first come to Storybrooke, all those years ago, he had perched on a number of roofs to scout out the lay of the land. Finding the high perches had reminded him of the crows nest and it had been a comfort in this new land without magic. Something he could use as familiar while he tried to find his north star. Somehow, Killian doubts she has the same motivations. The roof is as devoid of Swan as every other part of the town, scowl deepening as he stalks across it, needing to burn off some of this energy. His feet take him to the edge of the roof, scanning the streets as he tries to work out what he can do.

 _Jump_ , a voice hisses in the back of his mind. He has many demons in his mind, many dark thoughts that he has listened to for far too long. Killian has been getting better at ignoring them, but this one grabs hold of him and doesn’t want to let go. Emma has always saved him in the past and although he doesn’t want to play the damsel in distress, it might draw her back out to him. He loves her and he knows she loves him still, would want to keep him safe. Wasn’t the whole blasted point of this to keep him safe in her own mind? If he put himself in danger, she will save him.

Jaw is set, tensing slightly as he steps up onto the edge. Below him, too far to land safely is the pavement. The darkness of the street mocks him, a blackness that if he squints, he can pretend is just the inky depths of a deep sea. If this fails, it will just be like diving into the embrace of the water. And then perhaps he will rest.

(It will be nothing like that. His legs will surely break, snap under him like dry kindling over a fire. Bone will splinter everywhere. If he is lucky, then broken lower limbs will be all that happens to him. More likely than not he will break his arms in an automatic attempt to break his fall depending on how he lands, or crush his chest. If he is very unlucky he might scramble his brain, crack open like a raw egg. Dying from a fall really, really does not appeal to him.

He’s nearly drowned a number of times - he did drown once, and it hadn't even been at sea as it should. Emma had been the one to save him then too, had given up so much to bring him back. Killian had always assumed if his vengeance didn't claim his life, then he would die in the sea, his other mistress, his other love. She would demand her payment for all the years he had lived upon her. Dying at sea was not the peaceful end most thought. Dying in general, was not peaceful and does not appeal to him. He doesn’t want to die. He will do almost anything to avoid that.)

He trusts Emma Swan. She will save him, because she has always saved him. She has been saving him since the day they met and he is long overdue to return the favour. Killian does not allow himself any more time to think about this in case he talks himself out of it. For all he knows Emma is pulling out his heart this very second to make him change his mind.

“I guess we’ll have to do this the hard way.” With a grimace, he jumps. 

Air whips past him as he falls, the group coming up fast towards him, eager, hungry for his body. Killian forces himself to keep his eyes open, determined to face his end aware. A tingle of magic wraps around him, grey smoke enveloping him and blinding him despite his best efforts as he - as he doesn’t hit the ground.

He is alive. Standing on the pavement and there, so close he can take a few steps forward and touch her once more. She is _here_. Emma saved him just as he knew she would and some part of him feels a little guilty at manipulating her in such a way.

“You were that sure I’d save you?” She lifts an eyebrow as she speaks, something that is so very him, something he wonders if she learnt by watching him. It’s human and light and despite what he just did, Killian can’t help but smile at the sight of it. His obvious relief seems to break her composure, the mask of the Dark One cracking as she steps closer, anger on her face. “What were you thinking? Killian... we need to talk.”

\--

The familiar rocking of the Jolly Roger is like a lifeline, Killian gripping at the sensation like a drowning man. She brought them here of all places to talk, to his old home. His turf and he hopes that is a good sign, that she is finally willing to give something back. Or else this is goodbye framed as kindness and he thinks that would kill him more surely than the fall would.

“Love, what's really going on? Talk to me.”

“I can't. If you knew what I was planning, you would try and stop me,” she tells him, tone full of sorrow. There is a small, pained smile of her face and he knows she believes that. After everything he has done, everything they have been through, she thinks he would turn his back on her once he learnt whatever her terrible scheme was.

Whatever she has planned, it cannot be more stupid than becoming the Dark One in the first place.

“Please Swan, believe in me, in us. Just remember, we make quite the team.” 

He doesn't know how to convince her. Should he tell her he knows about his heart? Idea is dismissed almost as soon as it forms in his head, pushing it aside. Telling her he is well aware she is controlling him, even if he doesn't mind because it's her will not help. She will think he is saying it because not despite of his heart and she will run. Right now, she isn't running, she is on the cusp of fleeing but he still has a chance here.

“I could have left, I didn't.” His words are picked carefully, although her small, knowing smile does not alter. Wrong words despite the effort, because she thinks she is holding him here with his heart, thinks he couldn't leave, he can see it in her eyes. Bloody infuriating woman, she seems to have forgotten he walked into this with his eyes wide open, that he came to her, he stayed with her before this, that he agreed to having his heart removed - the first time at least. She is going to leave, already turning to do so, and Killian makes no effort to hide the panic in his own eyes as he reaches out, hook catching on her arm.

“Wait, Swan. Hear me out, don't I deserve that if nothing else?” That, at least, gets her attention. She is as still as a statue, but she is listening and he prays it will be enough.

“I love you. You don't need to tell me all the details of your plan, just... let me in. I keep scaling your walls, I always will. I will follow you, you just have to let me. You don't... you don't need to tell everything, it is enough to tell me something.” 

Not knowing is driving him insane. But he will let it if it keeps her happy. If it means she lets him stay close. Regina was right, he is a lovesick puppy dog, he is her willing slave and there is a tiny part of him that almost... resents her for that. He wants to claim he is his own man, nobody's slave but he is hers - for better, and lately, more often, for worse.

“I love you Emma Swan,” he repeats because it needs repeating and he will say it every hour for the rest of his life if that was what was needed, quite happily at that. Every minute, every moment of his life. She is worth being less of himself.

Her smile is still pained but it grows, Emma swallowing a few times before she nods, hand reaching out to grip at the edge of his jacket, holding him tight. 

“Alright,” she mumbles, head rocking forward to rest against his chest.

“I will tell you something.”

\--

True to her word, she tells him bits and pieces of their story. They slip out without much rhyme or reason, or even order. A sight, a smell, something reminds her of the past and now she tells him. Sometimes it is as simple as the two of them kissing in a field. Or the way they peered over the top of a horse stall to watch Henry talk to a girl and how she could feel Killian’s heat against her, his thick leather coat brushing against her cape. Or the ridiculous grin on his face that distracted her from the dark thoughts of Henry keeping things from her and made her just want to kiss every inch of him. She tells him what happened to a ring he thought lost.

Other times, it is more serious moments, meeting Arthur, working on saving Merlin. Her face always darkens when she speaks of Merlin, something she hasn’t shared yet. There is another story with what happened to the sorcerer but Killian can afford to wait now, to give her a little more time because finally she is talking to him. 

He treasures every word, every moment even when she tells him less palatable truths. Her words burn with honesty and she makes no effort to sugar coat what had happened. Emma seems to almost be fighting against herself at times, jaw clamping shut and words tossed out as if it is all she can do to let them out, word by word. 

(Killian is not so secretly pleased with how often her tales turn their focus on a certain piercing eyed smouldering pirate who loves her. More so when his appearances appear almost superfluous to what is actually going on in the story at that time. It comforts him to know she truly thought of him so often.)

The hardest parts of all, she can only share when he touches her. When she slides into his embrace, his lap, when she wraps herself around him and whispers terrible words into his skin. Tales of hearts being taken, nearly being crushed. Moments when Regina has used her dagger against her. The pain she had felt, the lies the demon had whispered into her mind. How it tries to twist everything she loves.

He wonders if this is why she stole his heart. To tell him, to know with certainty that he can forgive her for whatever happened in Camelot. To make him forget if he fails her again. Part of Killian wants to be frustrated at that, annoyed at that, at the way she is still holding pieces of herself back from him after he gives her his everything. The other half can’t quiet the whispers in his mind, the faint tendrils of fear that he did fail her. That they have been down this road before, that whatever she had done, he truly hadn't been able to forgive her for. Why else would she have taken his memories in the first place, if not to try again?

Gradually, Emma starts to run out of story, He can tell they are reaching the end, the way she draws stories out, how she lingers on the little things more and more, just to fill the space. Something hums through him, a nervous energy pent up, waiting for the truth, an anticipation that fills him. He is itching with energy.

Until, one night, she finally tells him how their story ended in Camelot.


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who has left comments and kudos on this so far, you guys feed my soul. Sorry for the delay in this part, but to make up for it, it is a bumper length part. Hopefully there won't be such a wait before part 4. Enjoy!

## 

** Chapter Three **

####  _**I love you as the plant that never blooms  
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers; - Pablo Neruda**_

__  
He is drowning on dry land. Drowning in the air of the bedroom, each inhale, every lungful of air makes him feel worse and worse. Everything is pressing in all around him, threatening to send him staggering to his knees, and he feels as though he is dying all over again. The world is getting smaller, dimmer and it is all Killian can do to force himself to breathe in and then back out. Dimly, a part of his mind registers this as a panic attack, and he is sure his heart is fluttering fit to explode, whenever it actually is.

“Hook... Killian,” she whispers, hand curling around his own. The sudden contact makes him flinch, pulling away from her as he tries to make himself as small as possible. He scrambles backwards, needing to get away and the only thought in his mind is escape. He is like a trapped animal, his mind clawing at the mental bars that have wrapped around him, almost mindless in his panic, in the way everything is wrong. Killian is wrong, the world is wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. She waves her hand, transporting them both to her living room, a mumbled whisper that the sea always calmed him and the spyglass offered the most beautiful view. Still, he can't bring himself to move, can't take the gesture for what it is, because all he can do is focusing on his breathing.

Telling him hadn’t been enough, he hadn’t been able to understand. Oh, Killian had heard the words alright, had understood the individual words, had understood them strung in a sentence, had grasped meaning but he hadn’t been able to grasp the flavour of them. He needs to feel them, needs his memories, the ones lying in the dreamcatcher she had brought with her for this story. Reluctantly, she shows him, restoring his memories and in a blink of an eye he remembers _everything_. What he did, what he had been willing to agree to in order to get his revenge. It always seems to twist back to his revenge in the end.

When it finally feels as though he is going to survive longer than the next second, Killian tries to take in the room around him, eyes lighting on Emma who stands a few feet from him, hands clenched at her side, tense and no doubt waiting for his reaction. For something other than laboured breathing, but he still cannot speak. What can he possibly say? Her expression is anguished, open pain written there and normally he would do anything to try and ease that, to take away her pain, no matter his own feelings at the time.

(Normally she hasn't just told him she had turned him into the Dark One after he had begged and pleaded for her not to, told her death was less painful than that. Normally he isn't the thing he hates most in all the realms. Normally he is at least a monster that he understands.

She thinks she can just do this and get away with it. That filling him with the darkness was somehow a good idea. She thinks that they can still have a future despite both swimming in endless darkness. She thinks he is strong enough to survive all of this. Why doesn't she understand by now? All magic comes with a price.)

He turns towards the window and away from her desperate gaze, trembling hand blindly reaching out to grip the spyglass. Metal is cool under his touch, a reassuring balm to the fire that is even now raging across his skin. There is the promise of the sea within the object but that requires more effort than he is capable of giving right now. Everything Killian is, he funnels into just surviving. She seems unable to take the silence any longer, hearing so much in the words he isn’t saying.

“I'm sorry! You were dying, I couldn't lose you, I love you too much.”

He's heard all this before. He’s heard her justify her actions, heard how he should be thankful, grateful for what she had done. She had made the hard choice after all. So what if she had disregarded his desperate wishes? 

She saved his life. 

He gets to live. 

How many others will die in his place?

Love is selfish. Love is cruel. Killian has always known this, had even thought it in connection to them before but it has never felt as true as it did right now, with his whole life crashing down around him. Fragments of lies litter the imaginary space by his feet. The lies of his world. All the long years of his life, and he has always clung to the truth of what he was and now that is gone. An honourable man who kept his own code no matter how far he fell. A man who never took a woman by force, a man he could just about face in the mirror on the better days. One Liam would have hated but then it all fell apart without him so it's hardly surprising the bar remained forever out of reach without his guidance. Outside of his revenge though, he had tried to do what was right. Dark yes, but never a Dark One. He has never wanted this power.

Under his grip, the spyglass trembles, flickering backwards and forwards on its stand as though it is him, shuddering between two truths, two realities. Between what had been and what now was, and all the while, as he feels the seconds tick on by, Killian can sense her impatience. It has taken his Swan weeks to reach this moment and yet she wants fully formed thoughts in seconds. His brother was not the only person he loved who has set the bar a little too high for a one handed pirate to reach.

The near silence stretches on, broken only by his hoarse breathing.

Killian can’t see it, but for the first time, he can feel her fingers wrapping around his heart. It isn’t hard enough to cause any pain, no pressure and really, he knows he shouldn’t be able to tell. Perhaps it is part of the ‘gift’ she has given him, she has saved him and suddenly he is so much more aware of the world around him. Everything is new. He has been reborn, and this new man - thing - can feel the magic she wields as though it were his own. It is his own now, he has magic, woven with hers.

Betrayal stabs through him, as surely as if her fingers were stabbing his heart.

“Do you... do you still love me?”

“With all that I am,” he replies, no hesitation in his answer. His head is killing him, the world is spinning alarmingly on its axis but that is the one truth Killian knows hasn’t changed and he clings to it grimly.  
Emma’s fears are getting the best of her, just as his own want to swamp him and he wishes he could tell her stop, could explain that she doesn’t need to do this. That he knows she has his heart, that she can just ask and he will tell her, she doesn’t need to compel him, doesn’t need to force him. He loves her and that will never change. Why would she trust him though? Killian can remember now, and he has already lived up to Dark One lies and Dark One tricks.

"Can you forgive me?”

A harder question now, one that he had hoped that she wouldn’t ask. He had known she would, the second she had gripped his heart to test her own insecurities, he had known she would. Emma is always brave, even in cowardice. 

“I... I don’t know Swan. It is a lot to take in.” His eyes close, hand finally dropping away from the spyglass to pinch at the bridge of his nose, still fighting to get his breathing under some kind of control. After a few moments, he opens them again, risking a glance towards Emma. She is frozen still, that same agonized expression still there as she silently begs for absolution.

It is a gift he cannot give her. Not right now. Not like this. Killian cannot tell her he forgives her or that it will be alright. There is so much possibility here, so many ways it can crumble, so many ways she hopes she can fix it. Her words from the past take on a new and terrible meaning, everything she has done, he sees in a new light. He cannot forgive her right now, as much as he wishes he could. 

(He can almost see the book laid out in front of them, the pages of this - their - story on display and Killian knows that this is only ever going to end one way. It won't be how she wants or plans, but badly. He wishes he can somehow spare her that, despite everything.)

The smile on his face is a little too wild, a little too stretched and full of broken promise. It feels unreal - everything about this situation feels unreal. 

“I just need... time.”

\--

It isn’t until later that he is able to unpack all the memories that have appeared in his mind. They had appeared compressed, pinned together like the leaves of a book that had fallen into water and then pressed down with rocks to squeeze out the liquid. Killian isn’t sure what that makes Emma exactly - the weight? The water? He is sure that it doesn’t matter in the end, doesn't change any of the memories that are crinkled and fading, slowly coming back to life. All that matters is that they are blooming once more. 

The worst ones of course are the ones that blossom first, welling up like blood in a freshly made wound. They pool around the holes in his mind, mocking him, hurting him. Killian can feel the cut on his neck, precious life pumping out with every inhale and exhale. It's ridiculous, he knows that the wound is gone - gone because he died? Because he is apparently immortal now? Whatever the reason, it is gone and it never truly hurt in the first place. A flesh wound he had thought, little more than a scrape. Instead it had been the end of all things and he can feel it still, in the same way he sometimes feels his missing hand.

An ache born out of absence, of things not there. The ache of the past, of the lost and he gets forever to remember now.

Every time he closes his eyes, he sees the vault again. Can feel the shake and strain in his limbs as he had forced himself to his feet, wondering where he was. The devastating realisation that she hadn’t been able to let him go. The tendrils of black that had wrapped around him, curling up his body, sinking in. Taking him even as he tried to struggle free. The misery of his life played out for its entertainment.

(The all consuming awe that she hadn’t been able to let him go.

He’s never had someone love him that much before. It’s selfish, dark, wrong but it doesn’t change the fact that someone loved him so much, that they couldn't let the world turn without him in it. Would he have done the same for Milah? Would he have done the same if the roles were reversed and it was Emma lying in that field? She would have asked to be let go he knows, would have taken the sacrifice because that was in her nature. Killian would never have dreamed he would offer the same, would realise the cost and say too high, but he was different now. Broken. Broken because surviving at all costs wasn't good enough anymore. All the broken dark parts of him think she loves him this much, she loves him so much that she has to save him, and he feels awe. Awe and horror because the other broken parts of him know better. She saved him for the world's ending and he will be its herald.)

As much as he feels it all, Killian can’t help but feel a little relief that his heart is gone. That the memories are separated from him by more than time. The ice of being heartless protects him and he doesn't want to imagine what they would feel like if he could truly feel them. 

Killian wonders if this is what going mad feels like. If this is why what happened to him in Camelot, happened, when he felt everything at once.

\--

Working on the Jolly Roger gives him something to focus on aside from the monster he is now. It is soothing, familiar and Killian clings to that sense of normality. He needs these moments and he has the feeling Emma needs them too, when they act as though nothing has changed. Fingers dance over the rigging, testing it as he goes, making a note of which parts need fixing. He likes to get an overview of what needs to be done before making a start, tries at least to have a plan before diving in. All too often though, he goes by instinct, lets his desires guide him with little plan to back them up. He has to do better now. He needs to do better now. 

This is the first time she has left him alone for more than a few minutes since he learnt the truth. Not that she wanted to leave him, Killian knows she would have brought him with her if she could but she plans to face her parents again and she doesn't want to risk him. He's not some tame toy, he should be with her, he knows this. Both are afraid the town will see the truth written on his face though and it is enough for him to stay behind. Killian had bitten down on the urge to beg her not to leave him alone, caught the inside of his cheek so hard he is amazed he didn't bite straight through. He can be alone, this is fine, and he is where he feels at home but he can't help the churning sensation in his stomach. Sea sick for perhaps the first time in his life and it has nothing to do with the waves.

“Look at you dearie. I thought you were never going to wake up.”

He has been waiting for this moment, ever since Emma restored his memories. For the demon to plague him once more. It wants him, wants what he had agreed to do for it back in Camelot and the demon was bound to slither out of its dank, dark little hole sooner or later. The waiting has set him in edge, a tense hunch of his shoulders as he tries to see it out of the corner of his eye. At the back of his mind, Killian knows it would wait till he was alone, until he was at his weakest but he wishes it wasn’t so patient, wishes it would face them both together. 

Why would it do that, and run the risk of losing when all it has to do is wait? The Darkness is patience after all, it has countless centuries of patience to draw upon.

She kisses him everytime it looks as though his thoughts are turning inward, whenever darkness touches his features. Emma knows how to read him, how to decipher the play of light and shadow that dance across his features and she can always tell when he is heading down paths neither want to use. 

Emma kisses him in those moments and she never notices, she never seems to act-

“Well, what did you expect? This _is_ Emma after all.” 

( _You’re ours again, our own weak plaything_ , a voice croons in the back of his mind. It feels like sharp nails dragged down the back of his neck, tracing the bumps of his bones though his skin as it weaves ever lower down his spine. This is not the voice of Rumplestiltskin he realises with alarm. This is someone different, feminine, seductive certainly but it is not Nimue either. There is something familiar about it though, a slight twist of an accent similar to his own. He feels as though this is a voice he knows somehow, a voice that he has heard but in a different light, a different accent perhaps. 

_Oh you sweet fool. You think your crocodile is all that lies in your head now?_ It laughs, something rich, dark and terrible. The sound sends a chill through him, the cold gripping hard and not wanting to let go. _We are going to enjoy taking you again. You taste delicious._ )

He shouldn’t reply. Killian knows he shouldn’t reply, that talking to the demon simply feeds the demon. But ignoring it doesn’t work either, he needs to be distracted, driven from his mind and without Emma here, there is nothing that works. Then again, he has yet to try rum, the miracle substance that cures almost every ailment. It certainly silenced other voices in his head over the centuries. Eyes lift in the demon’s direction, an acknowledgment, a silent response and it simply makes the crocodile grin, taking it for an invitation to hiss its poisoned truths.

“She never was any good at seeing you was she? Newly a Dark One and you played her back in Camelot. And now here. All your memories restored, heartless, literally unable to lie to her and you are still playing her. She doesn't seem to have a clue. Bravo dearie, I’m impressed.” It is being honest, he can hear nothing but honesty in its tone and that sickens him worse than any lie. To know that the darkness is pleased. It almost makes Killian rethink his whole plan.

Almost.

Eyes lower once more, staring at his hook, the way it glints in the sunlight. It would look better splashed with blood, the tip tinted dark red. It would look its best buried deep within the Crocodiles throat. Gold isn’t immortal now, isn’t powerful. Just a weak, mortal coward. Killian doesn’t need magic to finally get his revenge. He doesn’t need power or skill, or anything beyond a sharp instrument such as the one attached to his arm and he could finally be free. Milah could be free. Vengeance is an end, not a beginning, but he can’t deny the idea of an end - any end - tempts him at times. He is just so tired. 

_Just kill him_ the darkness whispers, pleads. He can almost feel its breath against his neck, its teeth by his ear. _It would be so easy. She might be angry but better forgiveness than permission remember?_ The visible representation still stands in front of him, Killian just able to see its feet beyond the hook he is forcing himself to stare at. If he looks at the darkness, then he will just remember how badly he wants to kill the fiend. He cannot. He will not.

(Gods above and below, but he wants to. He wants to hear the choking sound as the Crocodile tries to breathe around the weapon buried in his throat. He wants to smell the blood as it pours out of the the hole, the rich metallic tang scenting the air and driving him to a frenzy. He wants to see the light fade away in Gold’s eyes and know that the monsters last thought, last view was of him.)

“Hook!” As if summoned by the such thoughts, Emma is suddenly there, standing by the gangplank. He lifts his gaze to hers, hook forgotten, desire for death forgotten, all swept away by the sight of his Swan. She is lit by the sun despite the darkness that infests them both, her green eyes snapping between him and the crocodile. It grins, hands lifting to its mouth, as if trying to hold back a secret.

“Oh you’re here. I’ll leave you two lovebirds alone, to have a heart to _heart_.” 

Killian doesn’t miss the way the demon’s voice lingers on the final heart or the way Emma tenses up in response. He doesn’t even blink as it vanishes from sight, retreating to see how its latest volley lands and he only wishes it won’t come back. She approaches him slowly, uncertain, almost as though he was a wild animal, something to be weary of. Pale hand lifts to reach out to him, trying to bridge the gap, Killian watching out of the corner of his eye. Maybe it is the darkness still coiled around him but he can’t help but notice her hesitation, the weariness that had been in her movements still present in that gesture. As if she still can’t quite bring herself, in the final reckoning, to trust him without reserve.

“Killian... whatever he said to you, please, let me ex-”

“It’s alright love,” he interrupts and Killian doesn't think he can take it if she tries to apologise again, if she uses this moment to justify her actions one more time. He might scream if she acts as though she was purely in the right, scream until his throat was sore and the darkness lived behind his eyes, everything good in him destroyed. “I already know.”

“You know?” Her expression is shocked, unguarded in this moment, pupils blown wide. Hand is frozen in place, a few inches from his shoulder and Killian has to bite down on the urge to step forward and just take the touch. To let himself be soothed by her warmth and let the harsh reality flicker away around them.

He shrugs awkwardly, fingers resting on his belt as he angles his gaze a little to the left of her. He isn't staring at anything in particular, he just can't look at her right now. It hurts to look at her sometimes, and this is one of those moments. Emma twitches slightly, and he knows she is fighting the urge to look to her side and follow his gaze. To see who he is looking at in preference to her. There is nobody there, but sometimes it's easier to look at empty space over the pitiless sun.

“I’ve known since the first morning Swan. You’re not the first person to mess with my heart or even the second. Man gets to know the feeling of being heartless.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Shock turns to confusion, suspicion and Killian can practically see the wheels turning behind her eyes as she tries to understand this. She takes from him in secret and yet can't understand why he keeps it secret in turn. It makes him want to laugh. Something low and throaty, breathless. Madness touched. 

“I liked knowing. I was afraid if I told you, I might stop knowing. And it didn’t change anything.” He opts for raw honesty instead, swallowing down the noise and pushing it away, to join the darkness, to join the images of death and destruction. His tone is remarkably even, something Killian notes distantly. Blunt but even and he doesn't enjoy the slight flinch his words cause her, the silent acknowledgement that she would have taken that memory as she had taken the rest. Fear, not love, drives her, he thinks. So much fear that it is a wonder that they both haven’t suffocated under the weight of it yet. Emma stares in silence, as if waiting for more, waiting for the sting in the tale. He has nothing else to give her right now, nothing beyond the laugh that he refuses to share. She hesitates a moment longer before that hand finally drops, the movement breaking something between them. Red glows in her fingers, his heart suddenly there and once again, he can’t breathe. 

She is offering it without words to him, offering to make it right - but only because he knows. The darkness hisses and spits in his mind, a bubbling mess under the surface and Killian wonders when she would have told him the truth. When she would have offered to give it back if he hadn’t already known. The potency of the gesture is lost against the reality of what it really means. Nothing. Worse than nothing and he feels a faint flutter of something that might once have been anger, a shifting emotion before it is lost under the confusion once more. 

“Keep it,” Killian whispers, voice low and broken. Breath is deep and shuddering, as broken as his voice as he draws in air, eyes closing right against the sight in front of him.

“What?” He thought he had surprised her before, thought he had shocked her by knowing but now he realises that it was nothing compared to this moment. Killian still can’t look at her, or at his heart because he doesn’t want to plead, doesn’t want his darkness to destroy things, people and he is so close to that he can all but taste it. 

“Just a little longer... while I think things through. I don’t want to hurt anyone Swan. I don’t plan to, but maybe hold onto my heart until I’ve managed to understand this.”

\--

Her fingers play with his hair, curling around the locks at the nape of his neck. He has let it grow out a little, longer than Killian is normally used to but Emma seems to like this new look, the messy fall of his hair, a fringe that is forever falling into his eyes and obscuring his gaze. Beyond being dashing for the ladies, Killian has never particularly cared one way or the other how his hair looked, had tried different styles over the years. This one, she seems to favour and so he leaves it long, lets her fingers dance through it, threading over and over as she makes absent patterns. However, he is not wearing a ponytail again, not even for his Swan. A man has to have some pride.

(Of course he will wear that damnable ponytail if she asked, he can refuse her nothing. His dignity would be sacrificed in an instant for her. It’s nothing compared to what he has given up or had taken in the past.)

This version of Emma seems far more tactile, driven to touches so easily. Reassuring herself that he is still there, that all it takes is for her to reach out and she can feel him. Killian wonders what she sees in the darkness between blinks - his betrayal as he crushed Merlin’s heart or his body as he bled out in that field. He honestly doesn't know which hurt her more.

_I love you._

She says it first more often now, as if she feels the need to remind him, to press upon him her feelings. To tell him that it was worth it. Her betrayal, his betrayal, the loss of everything they had been was worth it for everything they could be now. They could have a future together, just as he had promised. Full of death, destruction and violent impulses, and Killian isn't sure how she planned to keep him sane. If she planned at all, or if she had simply acted on impulse and trusted to fate. Maybe Emma had always planned to take his heart, and he feels the darkness agree with the thought, feels a stirring of some foreign emotion. Something chill and strange, a pressure in his chest.

“I love you Killian.”

Perhaps she says it first more often to try and wipe away the memory of the first time, when he had already decided he was going to betray her. Hearing the words had shaken his resolve in Camelot, had sent the darkness into a tailspin. She loved him, she loved him and the old Killian had surfaced briefly, had tasted fresh air and treaded water. 

Returning Excalibur had thrown the dark version of himself, had caused him to doubt his plan, to wonder what her plan was, that she would give him his tether. He has two weaknesses and it had been easier when they were together, even if opposed to him. Doubt had gnawed at the evil. Doubt which had blossomed into love, something fierce, bright and if only he had been strong enough to stay in that emotion. If only he had let the kiss do its magic instead of the darkness slipping back in with its whispers of lies, tricks. That she was playing him and better to play her back first. Better to cast the Dark Curse and take the crime on his shoulders so they can all go home.

No matter what she sees in the darkness, what he sees in the space behind eyelids is always the same. He blinks and in the void is still the vault. Always the vault and always he falls back into it, lost to her once more.

 _Perhaps she is waiting for you to betray her again_ , the darkness suggests, voice waspish, snide. Declarations of love are not something it enjoys. Not in the moment anyway. After, when it can twist them, that is another matter. _We all know it is only a matter of time._

“I love you too,” he replies, and it is his own little rebellion against the darkness, drawing some sick satisfaction at the way it hisses and claws in his mind, hating that he means it, that love is currently stopping it from getting what it wants. Smirk curls onto his lips, reckless and wild. He might be heartless, might be fighting the call of the night but there are some things he just cannot resist. Somethings where maybe, just maybe it isn’t so bad to be dark. Her green eyes darken a little in response to his expression, matching hunger he knows must be visible in his expression.

Killian turns his head a fraction, leaning into her touch so that lips brush against the inside of her wrist. His kiss is soft, a hint of what could be and the smirk grows against her skin as she shudders, drawing in a breath. He has known for a long time how to make Emma sing, to create a mermaids song that draws him to a perfect doom. He wants to hear her sing. He wants to make her sing. He wants to lose the pair of them in sex and sin and forget about the world for a night. He can’t though. Because if he stops thinking, if he loses control then that gives the darkness it’s chance. Declarations of love might not be its favoured thing, but the sweet sin of flesh against flesh is certainly its cup of tea. Emma deserves better than that. Emma deserves a man who can truly love her, and Killian can’t right now, not without his heart.

“What of my many wonderful qualities do you most love about me?” Words vibrate against her wrist as he speaks, his stubble brushing against her. Eyes slant to the side to watch her, peering at his Swan through the long eyelashes she has complained jealousy about in the past. She blinks at him, clearly confused by the question, by the pull of touch and then the demands for words. 

“I love that you’re mine.” Her answer slips out without much thought, answering him automatically. Mouth snaps shut after the final word, a clink of teeth against teeth as if she is trying to physically catch them and drag them back, to somehow unsay them. 

He isn’t upset at her answer.

(He is.)

Killian should have known better than to tease, to flirt like that when the darkness was so close to the surface, should have known that it would take this opportunity to twist the truth. And it is the truth - or part of it at least. Perhaps not the part that she honestly loves the most, but he knows that she loves the fact he loves her exclusively. That there are moments when his entire existence is wrapped up in her. That he could be so easily submerged to her. There is more to Killian than Emma Swan, but so much of that more is bad, rotten. His past filled with all his many mistakes and is it so surprising that sometimes he wants to be nothing more than her - whatever term she wants to use to define them?

He waits and lets her set the pace, he lets her make the choices. He lets her decide how their relationship goes because he _really is a pathetic love sick puppy dog that doesn’t need her to wield a sword or a heart to get him to do her bidding_ the darkness hisses, slipping in and over his thoughts, voice that strange female that he knows he knows, using his accent. Killian understands Emma answer even as the darkness tries to twist it.

Snow and David love her of course, love her with that unending love that good parents possess but as much as they adore their daughter, the love they have for their child is split, shared equally with Neal, as it should be.

Henry will forever love her, but he calls more than one person his mother and as much as it pains Emma to have to admit it, he will always love Regina just as much. Only a True Love such as the one between a mother and her child could have inspired Henry to believe in the Evil Queen, just as only that could have set her on the path to realizing she could be more than her title.

Everyone else Emma loves, she has to share. He isn't sure if it bothered her before, back when they were innocent but he knows it bothers her now. The darkness gives her the ability to be selfish without guilt and he can tell that she revels in it now, takes what she wants after all this time of pushing it aside, putting others first. 

She has Killian and Killian has her. Just her.

(And the demon in both their heads.)

\--

This is how their relationship goes now. They play the roles they have assigned themselves during the day, Dark One and heartless slave. They work on her plan, little pieces at a time, a jigsaw making up a larger picture. He knows the broad outline now, the desire to be rid of the darkness in both of them once and for all. It makes the voices howl and spit, rattling snarls as they shake the bars of the cell his mind has become. There are still some details he doesn’t know, Killian can’t work out quite how she plans to remove the darkness but he knows it is the part that she believes he would try to stop. As if anything she has planned is worse than this living hell. Try as he might though, he cannot think of any way.  
How do you remove an immortals power without transferring it to yourself and killing them in the process? 

All Killian can do is trust that she has thought of a way as they work on the potion. He knows a little of magic - you don’t spend lifetimes trying to kill a mythical monster without learning what you can of the power it possesses after all. He knows they are making a potion that will call magic to another but there are moments when he wonders - there is nothing but blackness in this power they are making, there is no light and how can it work without the light magic he hopes has to still beat within her? He needs to learn more.

They toil in the day but the night though. The night is theirs and they are themselves once more. Free to indulge in whatever Emma might desire, Killian drawing what limited pleasure he can from it, what little his iced soul allows. They dance, they talk, they stalk through the shadows to watch the lives of those she loves play out from a distance. He wonders if she ever watched him in the way they watch Henry or her parents, if she ever checked up on him or if she had planned to bring him to her from the start. They have always interacted in a way she never allows with the rest. 

They are two dark things, together in the night. It is all he can give her. That, and this;

“He didn’t even try and convince me you know.”

She turns a little to face him, resting her chin on the palm of her hand. There is an expectant look on her face as she waits for the rest of the story, the pair laid out on a blanket he has spread over their back garden. A grim parody of a picnic, a date night. Complete with basket of goodies. Not that they need to eat anymore but going through the motions comforts them both. 

“The, ah, the demon. When he suggested a dark curse, I said I wouldn't use your heart. He didn't try and argue.” 

It seems important somehow that she knows this. That she knows his betrayal hadn’t been total. Despite the fact that he had crushed someone's heart to enact a dark curse with the aim of finally killing that crocodile, Killian wants her to know that there had still been some things he had still considered sacred, some prices he had been unwilling to pay.

For all he knows, she might have already seen it. Killian doesn't think he could resist taking a peek into other people’s memories if the temptation presented itself. Even if it had been moments he has lived himself, the idea of knowing what another thought and saw, to truly see the world in anothers eyes, it is pure temptation. He’s a pirate, he’s Captain Hook - temptation is never resisted. He knows and accepts his own weaknesses. God only knows, he has so many.

 _Telling her secrets she might already know to make her think you trust her, very clever_ , rasps the darkness, opting for the voice inside his head more and more as time goes by. It’s harder to ignore a voice inside your own skull. The mocking lie twisted truths it presents and there are times when Killian cannot tell the lie from the actual truth. This is one of those times, and he doesn’t know if he told her simply to tell her, to show some part of him loved her even then or if the voice was right, and it was to make her trust him properly once more, so she would fill in those few remaining blanks.

He blinks a few times, a rapid series of motions as he inwardly tries to will the sound away, to ignore its mocking words. Killian does not want the second reason to be true, he doesn’t want to use her, to play or trick her. He doesn’t want to be that thing again.

(Perhaps if he wills it enough times, he will simply make it so.)

Her smile is sweet, innocent. Hints of the lost little girl she had once been and he knows the little moments, the little truths matter to her. She leans into him, her hand sweeping up his cheek as they kiss. It is as sweet as her smile, something chaste almost, a thank you breathed into the kiss, whispered against lips as she slowly pulls back. Killian forces himself to smile back at her, to bury the slight sting that she either still didn’t notice or didn’t care that the kiss is wrong. He is still wrong, but at least in this moment, he has done a little thing right. She knows there is hope for them both, or was, or will be. All she has to do is fight for it with him.

\--

Emma plans to make Gold into a hero.

He has to repeat the words a number of times in his head, struggling to understand them in context of each other. She wants... Gold... to play hero. Gold. She believes that Gold has the capacity to be a hero. To do the right thing and as much as Killian knew himself to be the villain of the story when the man had whimpered and simpered on the desk of his ship, there had been no trace of a hero in that man. Courage is not a limitless thing, a resource that some people have endless supplies of. It lives in most people, jostles next to cowardice, in various degrees. He knows this, just as he knows it is possible for anyone to be a hero. 

Rumplestiltskin however, makes a very improbable hero. 

(If Captain Hook, scourge of the sea, the most fearsome pirate to ever set sail can steal the crown of heroes, why not the crocodile?)

Emma needs a hero to retrieve Excalibur, but not a hero like her mother or father. Not a hero that would ask awkward questions, that would care why she was doing what she was doing, not beyond their own immediate quest. To do whatever he had to do in order to save the woman he loved. In a way, Killian can’t help but admire her choice. Who would suspect her of using a former Dark One for a mission of light? Even if they were somehow to divine her purpose and realise she needs the sword from the stone, there are so many obvious targets she could - should - go after. So many people Emma could try and trick over that worm of a man. 

He has yet to see her fail truly. But he can’t be there to see her succeed. It is more than he can stomach to stand and watch Gold do something good, even if he has to be manipulated and forced into it. In all honesty, Killian doesn’t trust himself in the same room as the man and to not do something rash and bloody.

The darkness laughs at that, a lyrical giggle that spins and rolls around and around his head like some inescapable thunder. 

_What's the matter lover boy? Jealous she’s focused on someone else? He wasn’t always the demon of your nightmares, you helped forge him, just as he forged you. What a pair you make, so much more alike than either of you want to admit._ Nimue today, crisp, cutting. Every word a sharp stab as the darkness vents its frustration. It has been denied what it wants for as long as there have been Dark Ones in the world but never has it been denied like this. To be so close and yet trapped between two bodies. One unable to use it and the other still fighting against what it wants. It can’t even console itself with the blood and mayhem a normal Dark One would rain down, the only creatures it can hurt are Emma and Killian themselves. If only knowing that could somehow ease the blows or numb the strings as it delivers one final swipe. 

_In another reality, you two could have been friends. You deserve each other, Pirate._

\--

It’s no surprise that Killian retreated to the Jolly Roger while Emma did whatever it was she needed to do with Gold. The house they share is made toxic by the crocodile's presence, her plans threatening to unravel Killian’s hard won control. He needs the security only his beloved ship can provide, a moment where he is Captain once more. A moment where he is in control of his own destiny. 

“Ahoy!”

A moment to himself is all the world seems content to grant him however, the shout followed by the sound of footsteps crossing the deck, the slender form of Henry instantly recognizable. Killian freezes, hand still holding the recently repaired netting as he stares at the young man, some part of him silently willing this to be a hallucination, a trick of the magic in his head. He hasn’t seen the lad since that last movie night, the night he had broken and gone to Emma. The night he had known there would be no going back from. Out of everyone in so called Team Hero, he feels the most shame and regret at his actions when he is faced with Henry. The boy deserves so much better than everything that has happened to him - even if he can’t recall all of it and Killian is just as bad as Emma, by not telling him the truth about Camelot or Violet. He doesn’t want to have any kind of conversation with him, worried that too many truths, old and new, may come spilling out. The boy has a knack for seeing things as they really were.

For a wild moment, he even imagines diving over the edge of the ship to avoid this conversation. Coward. Coward’s thoughts. It’s enough to make him realise he has to face him, if only to get Henry back to his mother, Killian exhaling softly before he straightens his shoulders and descends the steps to the deck. 

“Henry, you shouldn’t be here.” This was technically enemy territory and Killian doesn’t rate his chances too high if Regina saw this as some kind of threat to her boy, and thought he was trying to kidnap him or something. 

Captain Hook does have form for that kind of crime.

“Hook. Tell me it's not true. It’s an operation right? Operation Fake Heart? Oh, oh, or Operation Bright Mother.” Henry ignores his words in favour of his own, staring up at him intently. Even now, he has so much faith in Emma, so much belief, words spilling over themselves as they tumbled haphazardly out of his mouth. The words almost cause him physical pain, the blind truth in them and how sorely they were misplaced. It had been an operation once right? They had planned together, and then somehow it had all gone wrong, Killian had messed up with the lad. Then, to compound his error, he had gone along with Emma’s in retrospect frankly ridiculously awful plan and wound up hurting everyone she loved. He was a monster and he didn’t want to keep hurting these people. He can't even look Henry in the eye, opting to gaze out at the water instead.

“Oh.” The word is so quietly spoken, a broken realization, his silence apparently answer enough. For a moment Henry is quiet, eyes lowering to examine the deck before he nods, bouncing on the balls of his heels. The sorrow is wiped clean from his face, new ideas and plans taking over as Henry adjusts. He is always so good at that, seeing the world break around him and then working out what needed to be done. Far too often he had an optimistic, even navie plan but at least it was a plan.

If he still had a heart, Killian thinks it would break at the thought of everything Henry has gone through, everything he has seen and still he manages to retain his pure heart and soul.

“Well, we will just have to save you then.” Henry speaks the words firmly, simply, as if it could be as easy and as basic as that. Killian shakes his head, resisting the urge to shake the lad, to try and shake some sense into him, to yell that the world doesn't work this way, that he can't just save someone like Hook. Especially when there are far more deserving people he should be focused on.

“Save your mother lad. Save Emma, and you save me.”

“It shouldn’t work that way,” he argues and out of all the many admirable traits Killian wants Henry to have inherited from either parent, that single minded stubbornness is not one of them. Not in this instance anyway when he needed to just agree. Killian has to get Henry back to Regina, he has to get him to drop this idea of trying to find his heart - he doesn’t want his heart back. 

(He does but he can’t risk having his heart back.)

“Come on lad, lets get you home. Regina is probably tearing her hair out looking for you,,” Killian answers, neatly side stepping the brewing argument. He can feel a headache coming on, and as a pirate, he is more comfortable with sword fights instead of verbal sparring. The sanctuary that is the Jolly Roger seems lost now. Is there nowhere in this blasted town he can find a measure of peace? Killian all but drags the lad down the gangway, letting his words wash over him without taking much notice of what the teenager was actually saying. It was enough that Henry was letting himself be moved onto the docks and towards the main street of the town. They manage about ten steps away from the docks before there is a puff of purple smoke and a furious looking Regina is standing in front of them, hand lifted in a threatening manner.

“What the hell are you doing with my son, pirate?”

“Woah, Mom, it's okay! I came to find Hook, he was just insisting I go home to you.”

Regina doesn’t look like she completely believes Henry’s words but a little of the murderous glint in her eyes fade. Her hand lowers to her side, fingers twitching slightly, making Killian think he has been a few seconds off a fireball towards the face. She seems willing to take a leap of faith, no doubt thanks to her son. Anger is replaced by cold curiosity, gaze thoughtful as she meets Killian’s gaze.

“Hook... Where is she keeping your heart?” Regina speaks the words slowly, each one drawn out and exaggerated, as though she is speaking to some small child that needs help understanding the question. Eyebrow lifts in dark amusement, and he can’t even bring himself to be insulted by her behaviour. As if she thinks he would turn on Emma like that. As if Emma would let him. After a moment, he shrugs and drops into a graceful bow, Killian opting for the figurative and literal truth, an answer that should be sufficiently vague to irritate her. 

“Where she always does your Majesty. She keeps it close.” The smile on his lips is all teeth as he answers, baring them at her in silent warning. If anything, the pain of his headache grows and he feels less and less inclined to give a damn about what she might think this moment is. 

Maybe, just to annoy her, he should ask Henry to come home with him, maybe he should take the lad to see Emma. She has missed him so much and Killian will do anything to make her happy. It’s minute, a twitch of a left eye, a tiny switch but all of a sudden Killian feels himself detach from the whole situation. He feels himself detach from himself even, feels a barrier between his thoughts and actions, words and deeds. Killian barely feels in control of his whole body. Stiffly, he finds himself spinning on his heel, deliberately turning his back on Regina to stare once more at Henry.

“Like I said, come on Kiddo, let's get you home.” He smiles as he says it, something fake and frighteningly empty. Bland, lacking the implicit threat of his smile moments ago, when it had been the fangs of the wolf. This is more the look of the sheep. It slips onto his face and stays there, that smile remaining frozen in place as though he has forgotten the expression he is making as Henry pulls away as if burnt. The teenagers eyes are wide, openingly horrifed. 

“Stop it, just stop it.” Henry snaps, and the pain in the lad’s eyes should hurt him more than it does. Killian feels his hand lifting upward, palm out in a supplicating gesture, every inch of him innocent although that blank smile is still on his face, mind as empty as that expression.

“Henry, what’s wrong?”

“I know it's you Mom.” Eyes are narrowed, staring up at him and there are moments like this when he is reminded just how much of Regina there actually is in her son. That icy expression, that tilt of the head is the dark haired Queen through and through. Inwardly, Killian breathes a sigh of relief at Henry’s words, the sheer determination in them. This is not something he is going to ignore. Even Emma seems to know better than to try and bluff Henry in this, another few seconds of silence between Killian feels himself pushed aside completely, Emma dropping the pretense. He is not in control of his own form, but at least he knows it now, can feel her manipulating him for her own ends, speaking through him.

“Henry. I’m sorry, but I’m still your mother, I didn’t think Regina woul-”

“Mom! Stop! This is Hook... it’s _Killian_ and you’re using him like a puppet!”

Killian gasps and suddenly it is his own thought and will causing his lungs to expand and contract. His breathing is his own again, limbs shaking as he staggers backwards. There is no clear thought in his mind but the desire to put distance between himself and Henry, in case Emma changes her mind and decides to play puppet master again. There is nothing he can do to stop her if she decides he is her Pinocchio again, her toy to dance to the whims of her strings but he has to at least try and protect Henry. Before she makes him change his mind again and think thoughts that aren’t his own. Killian wonders if it was the lads words or simply his expression of pain that finally got through to Emma, and if there is any way to know so they can use it again if they have to.

“Wait,” he croaks out, relief filling him when Henry actually does as he asks. Pained blue eyes focus on the pair of them, so many words begging to be said. It’s another chance to tell the truth, to tell them what he is, how much of a monster he really is. He doesn’t deserve their pity, he deserves to be kept locked away, just as they deserve to know what Emma did in Camelot. The words refuse to rise to his lips though, unable to be formed.

“Stay away... keep him away from me your Majesty,” Killian growls, words switching from Henry to Regina. He has a much better chance at getting through to Regina who never really gave a damn about him than Henry who seems determined to see the best in a washed up pirate. She needs to realise its best if they carry on focusing on Emma, and he needs... he needs... he needs to go home. He feels the urge now, an itching in the back of his mind that spreads across his body, thousands of tiny pin pricks, all agitating him to return to the house. It’s different to the urge he had felt moments before, that he bring Henry home but Killian still knows that it is not his own.

His heart. She used it again - and again and again - and she keeps making the same mistakes over and over, resorting to controlling him when things start to wobble around them. Damn her sometimes and damn her promises, that familiar weight of unknown emotion filling the spot where his heart should rest. Killian should know what this feeling is, but as always it darts away when he tries to examine it too closely, refuses to let him focus on it long enough to give it its name. It hurts. It always hurts. So much for never controlling him again.

(Then again, he is just as bad. He lets her stumble and fall before picking her up and allowing her to step right back over that cliff without warning her how deep the drop is or how hungrily the sharks swim below.)

“We’ll get your heart back Hook, I promise.” 

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep lad,” Killian warns darkly, casting them a final glance. Regina is still watching him with that calculated expression and for a moment he worries that she might have seen through the lies and realise this is not the story she thought it was. It’s getting harder and harder to remember that this was supposed to be a trick once upon a time. It feels almost normal now, to be without his heart. Maybe that is the point.

\--

He wants to feel anger. Preferably that same self righteous anger that directs so many of his Swan’s actions but any type of anger would work. Something to fuel him and keep him going as he marches on her orders. Instead, he is empty, forever empty. Pace is brisk, confident as he draws ever nearer to the house. Killian can feel the collar around his throat more keenly now, the sharp tugs on his leash demanding his return. It makes him feel almost light headed as he climbs the steps and pushes the door open, Emma having long since enchanted it to respond to his touch, letting him safely enter.

That all consuming need to go home fades now he is standing inside the building, something cold and empty taking its place. His whole body feels drained, wrung out and despite not needing to sleep anymore, the temptation is there, to at least lie down and perhaps ask Emma to use her magic to give him dreamless rest one last time. Emma. He can’t face Emma. Not right now. Not like this. Even as he thinks that, he knows he will have to, that she has called him back here after all. There is movement in the corner of his eye, Emma standing from the seat she had been waiting in. She seems to glide towards him, movements one smooth, continuous motion. 

Behind her, stands the crocodile, that familiar smug grin on its face. What lies has it been telling his Swan while she waited? What venom now runs through her veins because of the evil that wants to ruin them both? Whatever lies threaten to slip from ruby red lips, he isn’t sure he can hear it right now. Killian has had more than his share of battles today, has had to deal with so much from her plans in the morning to Regina and this is one too many. Silently, he moves through the house, gaze angled away from her as he heads for the stairs, hoping that Emma will give him this. 

“Killian, wait.” Her order brings him sharply to a stop, another pull on the invisible chains that hold him, hearing Emma draw in a harsh breath as he obeys. Eyebrow lifts as he turns to face her and there is no joy to be had at the pain she is feeling being shown on her face. It is always the same story, always the same dance, her need to be the one setting the pace means she denies him even the most basic of choices and only regrets it after the deed is done. Everytime he knows she whispers a new promise to herself ‘no more.’ And every time, like the addict reaching back for the bottle despite herself, she does it all over again.

“Really Swan?” He is losing her to the darkness, a claim she had once made at him. Losing her to the very night she swears she is fighting to end. Hand clenches and seconds later unfurls, a series of spasms unconsciously expressing the emotions he cannot properly feel. He shakes his head, dark fringe dropping down and casting shadows across his face as they stare at each other.

“Every time you use my heart, it gets easier and easier to do it the next time. Stop treating me like your dog. Or if you want a slave, you better stop pretending I’m anything else.”

“It’s not like that,” Emma protests, shaking her head. She trembles a little, gaze shifting from side to side, clearly battling with herself, torn between facing him and retreating behind her emotional walls. “You’re not my dog or my slave. God, Killian, how can you even say something like that? I just wanted to talk to Henry!”

“Aye?” His voice goes soft, ever so soft and he can see the way she coils backwards, recognising the danger in the gentleness. “And you had no other possible way to do that, other than to use my mouth?”

This time, when he moves to leave, she lets him go. Back out of the door he has so recently entered and towards the town.

\--

Testing the use of rum to keep this dark voice at bay was long overdue. If nothing else, he can use it to try and wash away the bitter taste of words that were not his own. There is still the problem of where he can actually go of course. The house is not an option. After the confrontation at the docks, he doesn’t feel the Jolly Roger is the place to go even though he has that barrel of rum just waiting for him. Granny’s would be near suicidal, it's practically hero headquarters and the last thing he can stomach right now is yet another fight. The Rabbit Hole is therefore his only choice.

It seems darker than the last time he was there, but then that suits his mood perfectly. Nobody seems to give him a second glance as he enters, buys a whole bottle of rum and then retreats to a corner booth to drink himself into hopefully oblivion. Assuming Dark Ones can get drunk. Killian isn’t sure what he is going to do if it turns out he can’t even enjoy alcohol anymore. 

Eyes flicker upwards, watching as Robin suddenly appears there with a cough, hesitating beside the booth. He fidgets for a moment, shifting from side to side as he clearly struggles with some inental thought, trying to decide how to approach this but even without words, Killian can tell this is different to when he faced Regina before, or even Emma in the house. Robin doesn’t seem to want to pick a fight or press him, his body language betrays a different reason for being here. It makes Killian relax slightly, trusting in the tiny movements, in his long centuries at learning how to read people.

Killian even feels a rush of near fondness for the other man. He’s missed Robin. He’s missed David, and Henry, he’s even missed Mr Smee. 

“Thank you,” Killian mutters gruffly, breaking the silence when it seems Robin won’t, dipping his gaze to examine the table instead. It is dark and scarred from age and misuse, marks covering its surfaces baring mute witness to all the trama it has seen over its long use. He knows how the table must feel. “Stopping her on the street. I, ah. I imagine it was painful for you.”

“Don’t mention it,” Robin replies easily, taking the words as an invitation to finally stop dithering and slide into the booth opposite him. He doesn’t even bother to ask before scooping up the bottle and only as he pours does Killian even see the second glass that he must have brought with him. Cocky, so cocky, and it is the sort of thing Captain Hook would have done if the roles had been reversed. There is almost too much of him in the thief, too much he sees and understands. It’s as if Robin is the man he could have become, a better version of the man he had actually turned out to be.

“Thank you for helping David.”

“I didn’t help David,” Killian hisses, leaning forward, faint stirrings of panic blossoming within and what if Emma is watching right now? As much as he is struggling, he fears behind abandoned by her completely. 

“I just meant thanks for not running him through with your sword,” Robin counters, and it's a believable lie if nothing else. Does Emma’s superpower work if she is watching through another's eyes? There is nothing he can do to but hope - the Lady Snow would have a field day if she knew how much hope was getting him through his life right now, how often Killian finds himself turning more and more to hope without any real form or substance.  
For a while they drink in silence, and it is as near to comfortable as it can probably be. Robin doesn’t press him for any information and Killian can pretend he is just sharing a drink with a friend, when lives were simpler. Still, really, Robin should be warned he is drinking with a Dark One.

“There is a storm on the horizon mate,” Killian tells him, lifting the glass to stare intently at the rum within. It almost glows in the dim light of the bar. His reflection looks distorted by the drink, as if it can see beyond the human face and into the darkness of the monster within. “Bad sailor who doesn't make for port.”

“A storm? What... can you tell me what she is planning?” It’s not a surprise that Robin would think he was talking about Emma, trying to drop hints and warn them about her end goal. What is surprising is how much he wants to correct him and not simply because he is slandering the woman Killian still loves. The desire for them to know is rushing through him, the desire that they realize the wolf is slipping the leash to roam along the sheep. 

“It's not Emma,” he tells Robin thickly, feeling as though he is talking around a mouthful of food - no, of blood, there is blood in his mouth and he is drowning, he is drowning once more. This is not something he should be saying, even as he tries to push through it all. It’s like attempting to wade through a marsh, every staggering step trying to drag him down and keep him silent. 

The darkness hisses in his mind, a chorus of voices all demanding quiet, silence. Robin is the enemy. Robin will not understand, Robin will go running to the others and they will put him down like the dog he is. Some part of Killian almost hopes that is true, the voices increasing in tempo until his head feels as if it will physically split apart right down the middle.

“It’s something... else. I can't... I can't,” Killian gasps out, hating how weak he sounds, how pathetic he is in this moment. His head is still ringing, every alarm bell he has ever head is blaring full volume. The concern on Robin’s face only makes the pain worse, jerking backwards with a soft cry of pain as the archer tries to reach out to him.

“Hook? Hook are you okay? Don’t try and say anything else, I shouldn’t have pushed.” Robin runs a hand through already messed hair, clearly at a loss at what to say or do. “I’ll go ok? Just. Don’t push yourself, we’re going to get you out of this.”

He’s going. Instantly, Killian can feel the pain start to recede, can breathe once more now he isn’t trying to force words out. The sight of Robin standing to leave as promised helps as well. Hurts just as much.

This is the last time he realises. The last time Robin is going to look at him with something akin to friendship in his eyes. Killian isn’t sure how he knows this with such gut wrenching certainty, but everything in him says that this is an end. The next time they meet will be different, will be in a storm, pain surging up on him that has little to do with the darkness trying to keep its secrets and everything to do with the idea of what might be to come. Killian wants to call him back, a sudden fear of being alone rising up on him. Teeth snap shut around the words, a sharp little clamp before he can give in to temptation, letting Robin walk out without another word instead. 

“I know what you’re doing dearie.” 

Killian squints, taking in the scales and wavy hair of the person suddenly sitting across the table at him, and not for the first time in the past few minutes he wishes Robin was still there. Robin was a much more enjoyable drinking companion even when he had been two gasps away from a panic attack. Then again, the beast in his head would probably have appeared anyway and he would have had to pretend there was nothing else there, that he wasn’t hallucinating imaginary people. The rum it seems, is not capable of keeping him out. Or rather, not in the quantities he has been drinking, which surely means he needs to up the dosage. 

“It won’t work you know,” the demon adds, a satisfied smirk on its face. “You may try and delay the inevitable. You might even succeed for a while, but the longer you keep it bottled up, the worst it's going to be when it finally breaks free. Only a matter of time.” It giggles, a high pitched sound that grates on his already shot nerves and his hand clamps further around the glass, knuckles turning white. Golden hand lifts, a mocking wave of farewell before it vanishes from sight. 

Another rum is swallowed roughly, and then another. Before Killian is really aware of it, over three quarters of the bottle is gone and the world is finally starting to take on a slightly alcoholic tinted glow. Holding his liquor is something Captain Hook has long since perfected, and it’s going to take more than this bottle to get drunk it seems. He’s in the right place to buy another if nothing else, glass raising to his lips, letting the liquid burn all the way down his throat. 

“Tick tock.” Words come out of nowhere, a blink and the crocodile is by his side and then gone again, his mocking words lingering. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick.

Hand tightens into a fist, the faint sound of breaking glass coming to his ears. He ignores it, or tries to at least, tries to push it away along with everything else in his life. Eyes stare out unseeingly at the bar and the people who mill around the room. Do any of them even realize what Emma did to save them? How she has given everything over and over again for this miserable little town and they all just carried on their stupid little lives without once thinking to thank her. If they think of her at all now, it is in feelings of anger, fear. Forgetting all she did to save them from Regina, from the Snow Queen, from the damnable Crocodiles plots over and over. They fear the Dark Swan she has become. Good. They should bow down to her, the once and future Queen. He will _make_ them bow - with a start Killian comes back to himself, away from his increasingly dark thoughts. Had they been his thoughts? His?

His hand is burning, a flash point of warmth. The heat is almost welcoming, albeit confusing and gone moments later, Killian blinking slowly as he tilts his head to look down. Dozens of tiny shards of glass litter the table, his shot glass shattered under his hand. Dozen more bite into the flesh of his palm, another slow blink as the information gradually filters through him.

The metal hook that replaced his hand lifts slowly, the metal catching in the light. Almost in a daze, he scrapes it along one of the larger slivers of glass, dragging it down and out, causing more damage to the skin in the process. It is almost cathartic, the way it hurts for a few seconds and then gone. The bloodied piece of glass tinkers softly onto the table, bouncing against the other pieces there. It is the palm of his hand Killian is watching, something more akin to disgust rather than awe on his face as the wound heals up before his eyes. Red seems to trace backwards, vanishing into the pale pink of skin, an unblemished spot in a minefield of wounds. If anything, the healed spot only makes him angry, reaching out to grab at the bottle. Every movement sends the shards still in his hand deeper, waves of pain that come and go. The pain, as brief and as fleeting as it is, is almost welcomed, a penance he deserves as he lifts the bottle to chug the remaining liquid. Only when the bottle is wholly empty does it slip from injured fingers to drop and then roll across the table. 

Killian knows he is a Dark One. Has known for some time now. He has heard the voices in his head, seen the crocodile prance around and tell its lies and yet it is only in this moment, staring back down at a hand that should be still on fire, at a spot that should still have an open wound, does he even start to comprehend what his change actually means.

\--

Injured hand is kept close to his chest as he staggers out of the bar, having resisted the urge to take his hook to his hand. To slice deep and slash all the glass out of his hand. It would heal back up. It would probably heal. The Dark One is immortal, all sorts of wounds heal as soon as they happen and it is only the fact the glass is still embedded in him that keeps the cuts from vanishing. Cold air hits him almost like a physical slap, Killian weaving along the road, not even bothering to attempt to stick to the sidewalk. Maybe he should just skin his hand, get himself keelhauled and regrow it all. 

That really would get the town talking.

“Swan!” Voice is enthusiastic, shouting out in the night air. She doesn’t appear, Killian staggering to a stop in the middle of the street now. Blue eyes tilt upwards, watching the constellations above. Emma can hear him - Killian knows she can always hear him. “Swan! Come on, love! I’m not mad.” 

Perhaps that is what finally prompts her to appear, grey smoke creating her form in front of him. Her gaze is weary, guarded, still prepared to carry on the aborted argument from before. Killian on the other hand simply grins at her, expression sloppy and open as he moves closer, blooded hand stretching out along with his hook as he spreads himself out for her.

“Swan, guess what? I can still get a little drunk.” Smirk shifts into something that is somewhat proud as he speaks, as though his discovery is something worthy of celebration. Emma doesn’t even respond, emerald eyes fixated on his wounded hand, mouth a tight thin red line.

Magic tingles across his skin, a crackling of time and space around them as the world shifts. The street vanishes, the interior of her - their - home reappearing in its place. Hand rests over his chest, touching where his heart should be. The pressure is gentle, almost non existent but it is enough to get him down on the sofa, settling there, Emma beside him as she tenderly examines his hand. 

It is strangely intimate, this moment. He could use violence, the weapon his hook really is. The weapon he really is. She could use magic, could remove it in an instant without any further pain or fuss. Instead, she opts for the tweezers she has conjured, the only use of magic she seems to allow herself. Each tiny shard painstakingly pulled free and dropped onto the little bowl on the table. This is her own kind of penance, Killian thinks. There is nothing to do but think in this moment as he sobers up - far too quickly for his liking. Nothing to do but watch as she pulls piece after piece out of him. It's easier to watch that, than the way his skin closes over the gaps she makes, as if hungry to be whole once more. Time passes in something of a haze, marked only by the sound of glass dropping gently against glass. It’s impossible to tell how long it actually takes - it feels at once like mere seconds and possibly days before the final shard drops down and the tweezers follow it. 

Even now, Emma keeps the contact, dipping her head, blond hair falling like a veil around her as she drops a delicate kiss against his palm, lips tracing along invisible scars that exist only in the never after. The shiver that runs through him makes his breath catch. It is all of a sudden too much, Killian pulling his hand away. Even as he is retreating, he is moving forward at the same time, a mess of contractions. Drawn hopelessly like a moth to his Swan, his light and she will burn him as much as he burns her. Once they might have brought out the best in each other, might have soothed raging storms and guided lost ships to harbor. Now, he fears they do nothing but bring out the worst.  
They rest foreheads against each other, Killian’s newly mended hand lifting to grab at her shoulder, fingers curling roughly in her leather jacket as if afraid she is going to pull away, retreat now his hand is fixed. Emma doesn't move - honestly, right now, it's impossible to tell if she is even breathing.

Killian allows himself this moment, a moment he has picked. For perhaps the first time since all this began. He picks the touches, he is the one who decides to move, and more importantly, she lets him. Pads on his fingertips trace down her jacket, following the patterns on the leather before moving further southward, finding her own hand. Fingers interlock with fingers, holding her tight.

“I just keep hurting you don't I,” she mumbles at last, clearly struggling to keep her voice in some kind of check. It’s hard, in these moments, to remember she is actually the Dark One, when her movements, her voice, all of it is just a lost and hurting girl. Killian would do anything - has already done it all - to try and keep that kind of pain out of her life. “Everything I try and do to make things better, I do wrong and you get hurt.”

He can't lie and say it's fine, or deny her words. Killian has long ago promised to himself that he wouldn't lie to her about them, a promise he intends to keep regardless of the orders she has wrapped like chains around his heart. A promise he will keep no matter how much she accidentally breaks her own.

But that doesn’t mean he has to tell her the whole truth. 

“I still love you,” he offers instead, hand tightening against her own, a reflexive squeeze returned as she leans into him. Head rests against his shoulder as they sit there, silence slowly filling the area around them. It is slightly oppressive, as if the lack of sound is weighing him down, a taunt for everything that has been unsaid, all the truths that lie unspoken. He loves her. He will always love her.

He just hopes in the end, it will be enough.

\--

She tries to apologise in actions.

They spend the next night on the Jolly Roger, drinking good rum and dancing to the music in their heads. Neither of them mentions the preceding days, not turning Gold into a hero, not pulling out the sword - beyond a terse explanation that she had broken the hold it held over them - not Henry aboard the Jolly Roger or the many slivers of glass she had prised from his skin. They pretend none of it happens, but she keeps on apologising regardless.

It’s in his favourite foods and the way they keep appearing around the house. It’s in the way she takes the time to think what they will do during their nights and picking activities she thinks he will prefer. It’s in the way she presses close at random times, kisses peppering his skin. They leave a trail of fire that dances across him, reminders that linger even as the rest of him grows cold. 

“She thinks you believe she doesn’t love you,” the Crocodile sneers, a look of disdain on its features. Killian doesn’t need the darkness to tell him that. No matter what it or for that matter Emma might think, he isn’t a complete fool. Her actions betray her fears, no doubt planted by the same darkness that now looks affronted by the emotions it has stirred up.

Emma loves him, he has no doubts about that, it is a truth the voices cannot shake. His very existence is proof of how much she loves him.

(His very existence is an affront to the universe, self loathing rising like bile in his throat, as easy and as unconscious as breathing.)

Killian only wishes he could love her like he used to. He wishes he could show her in word and deed how much he cares and how much he knows she cares but without his heart he is incomplete after all. He wishes he could kiss her and actually feel it once more. He wishes he could find the words to explain why he can’t have his heart back, and how he will be lost if she does return it. He wishes he could be the man she deserves, but he has never been that man. Even before all of this, before the Dark Swan, before the Dark Hook, he has never been the man she deserves. He wishes he could be worthy of her, just once.

The world isn’t run on wishes.

 _Well it could be_ , the darkness offers, tone reasonable, and he wonders if it speaks in his head so often instead of taking the form of his mortal enemy because it knows there is more chance of him listening to it. It adopts the form of the crocodile to torment him, but the insidious whispers in his mind tempt him to forbidden fruit, to the nectar of the Gods if he has the strength to just reach out and take it. Like Prometheus bringing back fire, Killian could start the world anew. 

_Take back your heart. Give yourself to us and you can have anything you want. With our power and her power, nothing could stand against your combined might and you can love her like you want to. If you can bring yourself to finally forgive her of course._

It’s true. 

The most frightening thing is that it's true. 

\--

“Honestly, you’ve never used your magic since we got back? Since I told you?”

“Never Swan. Never needed to.”

There is a fragile kind of truce between them once more, Emma moving more carefully around him, as if his hand was not the only thing that had fragments of razor sharp glass sticking out of it, cutting them both. She still asks questions while holding his heart, as though she doesn’t realise he has no choice when she does, using his heart without thought or possibly even awareness. To the best of his knowledge it is the only thing she has done to control him since that night with Henry and so he lets it slide. Dangerous, sending her back up on that cliff without informing her of how rocky the path is.

 _Tell her she is using your heart still. Doesn't she deserve to know?_ This new, reasonable darkness is far more terrifying than when it was simply lashing out like a wounded beast. There is an added cunning to its words, a long term plan. He can feel it thinking, can feel the way it reaches out tentatively, the malevolent intent as it probes, searching for weaknesses to exploit. The only way to defeat it, is not to engage with with at all, something he has to tell himself over and over again. It is a plan that is a lot easier to devise than to put into practise, when mere thoughts can engage with it. All he has to do is ignore it. 

Still, Killian can't help but wonder why it is using him as an intermediary at all. Why doesn't it just point it out with its hateful logic to Emma herself and tell her she is still controlling him?

_What makes you think we haven't? Maybe the lady doth protest too much pirate. But then again, perhaps you’re right dearie, maybe letting her use your heart a little is okay. She’s not doing any harm right? No point in picking a fight over something so trivial._

It is becoming next to impossible what is a truth and what is a lie echoing around his head. The automatic reaction is to deny its words, to take what it says and turn them on its head. Until it whispers contradictionary wants, until it suggests do something in one breath and too late in another. How can he hope to fight something when he doesn’t know the moves. Killian honestly doesn’t know anymore, if it actually wants him to confront her about his heart, just as he no longer knows what he should want or do.

Her look is disbelieving at the idea he hasn't used his new magic but she doesn't push it,doesn't demand more as she would have done at one point and she is trying. Killian knows she is trying, attempting to silence the whispers in both their minds, to prove that she does trust him, does believe in him. The conversation is over now, and the sensible thing would be to drop it. He doesn’t need to pander to her fears and worries - the old Killian would have sought to reassure her and he feels the stirrings of the now dead man she loved rising in him. A shade of the past brought to life for mere moments.

“I guess I don’t really feel it? I mean, I’ve lived hundreds of years Swan, without magic. I suppose having it now, well I am too used to how I feel without.” Half truths and lies of omission slip easily across his lips as they form into his trademark smirk. In truth, Killian would do almost anything to be able to properly return to how he had felt without magic, to be free of its voices and the muted call.

The disbelieving look doesn’t quite vanish from her face but she nods slowly, accepting his words for the moment. Another attempt on her part to show faith and it makes part of Killian want to cry. She should push, she should ask and demand and force this out of him because the darkness is expecting him to keep it quiet and taunting him for it. No, she should let it go, should trust him because the darkness wants him to take his heart back.

“I have to check on something,” Emma tells him after a few moments, gaze still uncertain and he should hate that he has put that expression on her face. “I need to get the final ingredient for the spell but I’ll be right back,” she promises, a kiss brushed against his cheek as she speaks. A pinprick of heat and he treasures that warmth for as long as it lasts, watching as she vanishes through the door. Final ingredient? The missing piece, the bit he hopes will tell him exactly what she plans to do to remove this disease that is rotting through the both of them.

“She’s going to work it out you know, and soon. You don’t ‘feel it’? She may not be a particularly good Dark One, but you and I both know, she isn’t stupid.”

Because of course the demon in his head would choose this moment to appear. It knows everything Killian hasn’t said, everything he dares not say and every question he prays Emma will not ask.

It sits cross legged on the floor, an eager look on gold shimmered features. The demon can sense the end game is approaching as much as he can and it clearly hopes for a bloody finale. Some part of Emma must know dusk is falling around them too. It’s form glimmers and flickers in the corner of his eye, and no matter where he turns to look, it is there, crossed legged but always there. A blot on his sight, voice grating and inescapable. 

“She’s only had magic a few short years, but it burns in her, as it should in you. What are you going to do dearie when she starts asking questions you don’t want to answer? You can only avoid answering for so long.”

\--

Swan was right. Isn’t she always? Now that he knows her plan, he wants to stop her. Killing Zelena may be an answer. For all Killian knows, it may be the only answer, and of course such a dark spell would come with such a dark price, he was so foolish to imagine it could be anything other than a life. Evil begets evil.

Killian has no positive feelings about the witch personally. She has done much harm to those he liked in the past. Much to harm David, Snow, and Robin, so much harm. Then, there were the wounds she has inflicted on him personally. It still stings, the way she had used the crocodile to play with him, to torment him. Zelena was just as good as any villian in knowing people’s pressure points, the weak spots that would hurt them the most and Hook has never exactly been subtle with what would injure him.

He will not lose any sleep over Zelena dying, nor shed a tear at her untimely passing. The world might indeed be a better place without her in it. And yet. That doesn’t make it right. Doesn’t mean Zelena should die. Or that she deserves to die like this.

(The wicked witch deserves to die for what she did and had planned to do. It was more than her curse on his lips, more even than the moment he drowned because of her in order to force Emma’s hand. She deserves to die for trying to kill a newborn baby without a care in the world, seeing it as nothing more than an ingredient. Even Hook at his absolute worse, had standards. Not many - an innocent life here and there, a child he could have cared for turned over to Pan for his own personal gain. But a babe? Something that small, that innocent and fragile. Baelfire had rejected Hook first and although that isn’t an excuse for his actions, it had at least been a reason. There is no reason to harm something so young as a newborn.)

Zelena is with child. He is only slightly reassured by Enma’s promise that she is using magic to speed up the pregnancy and that they will wait until after the birth. There is irony to be had here, in Zelena suffering the same spell she had used to speed up Neal’s birth but he can find little enjoyment in it. 

This is Robin’s babe too after all. The child makes Robin happy and that matters to Killian.

Emma is determined to follow her chosen path. He knows this without even trying to convince her otherwise. He knows _her_. Attempting to talk her out of this would be as useless and as pointless as trying to convince the waves to still. Zelena will die, no matter his own feelings, whatever they may be. All he can hope to do now is limit the damage done.

Movement is swift as he strides towards where she stands at the base of the steps, looking out towards the town. Emma hadn’t been able to look at him as she had explained her plan, told him that they had the witch right now, locked up in the basement. It had all been very clear, crisp, Emma at her worse when she is pushing away her emotions to lock herself behind every wall she can build. Not this time. Killian isn’t prepared to let her carve these new walls. Hand catches her hip, drawing her round in one fluid motion. Even as she is moving to face him, Killian is leaning in to kiss her, body flush against her own.

It is still wrong, the kiss, but in this moment, that seems the least of their worries. 

“Let me do it,” Killian whispers when they finally pull apart, chest heaving as he breathes in much needed oxygen. They remain close, swaying slightly together, his hand still resting on her hip. 

“What?” Her word is just as softly spoken as his request, a faint smile on her face as she chases his lip to brush a series of gentle kisses against him. Each one is more and more foreign to him, but he smiles as she no doubt expects, smiles because it is still her even if Killian fears he is no longer him. He knows she is trying to distract him. For some reason, Emma doesn’t want him to offer this, doesn’t want him to be the one to land the killing blow. This is too important to give up on, to let himself be distracted by his siren and so he forces himself to push on.

“Let me kill Zelena love. Murder changes you.” No matter how she says it is a necessity, this will be murder. He knows this. They can both dress it up however they like, can justify their actions to themselves and the world at large and yet at the end of the day, this would be nothing more than a murder. 

The heroes would probably come up with some alternative plan that didn’t involve the cold blooded murder of someone. The heroes aren’t here and Killian has long ago resigned himself to being the villian. If this is the only way to save Emma then he will kill Zelena so that when she is a hero again, it won’t be with that stain on her conscious. He doubts she will be able to look at him in the same way again if he is the one to do it but better him than her. Better she hate him as the Saviour than he hate her as Dark Hook.

Contact is abruptly lost as Emma pulls away from him, instantly mourning the loss of her heat and he feels the cold bitterly, to the extent that he finds himself almost wishing for that numbness of before. 

He looks down to find Excalibur in his hand. Fingers are curled around the hilt of the sword and he idly thinks how easy everything would be with this weapon under his command. It may not control either of them any longer but it is still the most powerful blade in possibly all the realms. Even without his heart, he could lay waste to everyone, could possibly even give Emma a run for her money if he is using this.

The darkness **screams**. A cacophony of voices, a conflicting chorus of wants and desires. To take, to cut, to destroy. To flee, to escape. Use it. Don’t use it. A trap. An opportunity. The sword is singing now, something low and hissing, worming its way into his thoughts. A hum he had believed he would never have to hear again is echoing around and around his skull, Killian taking a staggering step backwards as if he could somehow put distance between himself and noise within his own head.

Throughout it all, Emma watches with an expression of sorrow but makes no move to take the sword.

Nausea rises up in him, colour draining from his face as he stares down at the blade. Emma Swan is inscribed there in that black writing and hidden under the intricate pattern work is another name, his own. Suddenly, Killian very much wants to see that name, wants to see the truth written there in the black, wants to see without any hiding that he is the thing he has hated for so many centuries. He will need his heart back for that, reality chilling him further.

Fingers feel numb as he forces them to loosen their grip, the blade shaking a little. It is fighting him - or perhaps the darkness is fighting him, perhaps he is fighting himself. It doesn’t want to be abandoned once more. Even now, he can hear the whispers within the hum, the promise of everything he can achieve if only he grasps this moment that has been given to him. Keep the sword. Keep it! Inside his head, Killian screams. Screams against the void, against the darkness and he will not. He cannot. He will be without Emma if he keeps this and the world is not enough in comparison to that.

Weapon drops from limp fingers, blade clattering hollowly to the ground. The internal struggle has drained him, Killian following it in dropping to his knees as he pants heavily, unable to even stand. 

Finally, Emma moves. Just a little. A single step towards him. A single step towards the blade, and the weapon had not been in the garden before. Killian doesn’t know where Excalibur was before this moment but he is sure that he did not summon it. Thoughts are clear for the first time in a long time as he tilts his head to stare up at her. Understanding dawns as he meets green eyes, 

“A test?” 

“You were offering to kill someone! I had to be sure that it wasn't the darkness talking.” There is regret on her face yes, Killian can see that mingled with the sorrow and yet there is a stubbornness too. For the ‘greater good’ is all but on her lips and chest swells with that peculiar feeling once more, at the knowledge that she is constantly testing him, constantly finding him wanting.

“I offered to kill someone for you Swan. I meant what I said, it's bad enough when you kill in self defense. That changes you. But to kill in cold blood, to kill for sport or any other reason..” Killian trails off, a sigh on his lips and for a moment he could almost forget the weight of the sword in his hand and the power it proclaimed. This is a conversation he never dreams he would have had with her. 

“A part of you dies with them Swan. That part of me died a long time ago, I was simply trying to keep that part of you alive.” Killian knows what it is like to look in the mirror after such a thing, searching that reflection desperately for someone you might know. To find a stranger staring back time and time again. To lose yourself further and shatter the mirror only to be faced with dozens of strangers in the shards staring blankly at you. It is not a fate he would wish on Emma. It is not a fate he will allow to befall her and yet she tosses his gift aside with scorn and distrust. She is still determined to do this by herself, and thinks that he is just waiting for a chance to screw her over. His arm aches with the weight of a sword now lying on the grass between them. All this time and he is still on his knees in front of her. Still looking up at her, gaze hardening.

Can you not even pretend, for one moment, to trust me? To believe in me?” His words are not fair, deliberately chosen to echo back to a previous argument.

(Why should he be fair? They are fighting after all. He wants to hurt her, he wants the petty satisfaction of seeing his verbal blows land and inflict pain.)

This... this is anger. That strange weight finally has a name, after all the times it has come and gone, and it grips him now, something cold and dark and eternal.

How strange that he only just now sees it for what it truly is.

Killian isn’t used to an ice anger, hate and rage have been his companions for centuries but it has always burned hot. A raging inferno that sweeps him up, that burns him from the inside out. A flame that he has obsessively kept lit for centuries, tending it carefully. It is his own stubbornness that kept the anger in his soul, his own passion that allowed it to eat away at it until the fire and anger is all that was left. Until Emma breathed something back into him with their first kiss, and the fragile hope that he could be more. Now he is lost to anger again, but something cold and empty.

“What next my lady? What new torture disguised as a test or a way to free us, have you got planned?” Voice drips with scorn as he stares up at her. He doesn’t even have it in him to be surprised when she turns tail and runs up the steps from his accusations, sword vanishing seconds later.

\--

“Really?”

Emma's voice carries down the steps, disbelief in that single word. Something inside of him twists, snaps at that word. This is the passing of an age, something is happening inside, something bad. Or something good? Nothing is simple, nothing makes sense anymore. Nothing but this knowledge, however he has come by it. He needs to get inside the house. Now. Their fight be damned. Grass is damp under his fingers as he pushes himself shakily back to his feet, forcing aching limbs to keep moving. 

Door slams open as he barrows his way through, managing a few steps before freezing in place. No, trapped in place, held by magic and it takes a few moments for him to realise he can't move, limbs locked down, unable to move closer.

The scene in the hallway is like a tabular. Regina stands near the staircase, her hand held up in front of her and it must be her magic he can feel wrapped around him, chaining him to this spot. Emma stands frozen in front of him, Henry standing opposite, an empty vial held loosely between his fingers. Over his shoulder, Killian can see the living room has been pulled apart, the pair having clearly been caught in the act of searching for something.

The squid ink.

Clever lad, something akin to pride blooming in his thoughts. Even a Dark One is helpless against that. Near Emma's feet, lies Excalibur. It hums out a greeting to him, a promise making him flinch as he looks away, eyes slanting to the side. Henry moves closer to Emma, pulling side the flaps of her jacket as he searches her pockets for something.

It only takes Killian a few seconds to realize what that ‘something' almost certainly is, understanding forming a heavy knot in the pit of his stomach. The knot only grows as Henry gives a soft little cry of victory before pulling his hand back - as he feared, Killian’s heart is there, beating calmly away.

“Keeps it close...” Henry mumbles, both hands gently cupping the heart. “Sorry Mom.”

“Henry, lad, wait, you don't know what you are doing. Just... just put it down.” Killian stains again against the magic, struggling against the hold no matter how futile it is. The cold anger is still lingering in his body, darkness alert and gleeful. It strains too but he knows its intent is different to his own, its will pulling against his own. 

“Hook, calm down already.”

The relaxation that rushes through him is deep and unnatural at those words, sinking through every layer of him all the way to his bones. It feels as though he has just had the best night's sleep and before that, the best type of activities with a woman and he is utterly sated and spent. Sigh is more akin to a moan, a throaty sound as he just drifts into these new sensations.

“Henry!” Regina scolds, attention firmly fixed on her son. The magic holding Killian fades but he makes no attempt to move or retrieve his heart, simply standing there as though he had no care in the world. This is better. This feels good. He can feel this. “You need to be more careful about what you say when you are holding someone's heart.”

The expression on the teenagers face instantly slips into one of chagrin, Henry’s eyes staring down at the heart as though it was some dangerous weapon - and it is. In the wrong hands it could be just as dangerous as a certain magical dagger. The lad does not have the wrong hands, but he doesn’t know the truth, doesn’t realise what he is actually holding.

“Now Miss Swan, just to make sure there are no dark surprises...” 

Killian can feel a hysterical little giggle wanting to burst free at that, held down purely by the order to relax. If only Regina had any idea. She is too focused on the wrong Dark One and all he can do is watch as she fastens the magic dampening cuff around Emma's wrist, Henry passing her the glowing heart moments later. Anticipation curls in his stomach, a mix of his own and the darkness, and he can feel it holdings its breath. Are Regina’s hands the wrong ones?

(Killian knows he has the wrong hands.)

“Henry, why don't you go check out back for the dreamcatchers. I think we are all overdue our memories back.” Although it may be phrased as an order, Killian can hear the command in those words, the way she is used to being obeyed. Henry nods in agreement, casting them a final glance before he moves past the small group, and through the door, it clicking gently shut behind him. Perfectly manicured hand lifts, gesturing Killian to come closer.

He steps towards them as ordered, movements lazy and still relaxed. Henry is going to find out what his mother did. They are all going to find out, not like this, he doesn’t want the story to end like this. They are all going to feel Killian’s anger once more. This is probably why she sent Henry out of the room, not wanting him to witness the expected rage and heartbreak of a man freed from the control of the one person he should have been able to trust above all others. That hysterical giggle bubbles up within him once more and again, Regina has no idea. No clue as to what she is actually unleashing here, that a few angry words and looks are going to be the least of her worries. He wants to sob as well.

“Killian, I was going to give it back to you. That’s why I came inside, so we could calm down and you would know I was serious when I returned it.” Emma speaks lowly, words rapid as she tries to plead, to make him understand her side. 

He doesn't know how to tell her it doesn't matter. That it was never really a case of wanting his heart back, not after he has learned what she did to him. Regina being the one to return his heart will not change his feelings towards his Swan. They will change. They will shatter and reform, but it will not be due to her withholding his heart. Killian isn't ready. He needs more time to prepare himself, more time to work out what to do, how to do it. He just needs more _time_. 

(Time is the only thing he has needed since this whole mess began. It slips through his fingers like sand in an hourglass, mocking him with its immortal truth. There can never be enough time.)

“Wait, Regina, there is something you probably need to know first,” he tries, and he has to try, he should have tried harder before. There is no urgency in his tone though, no real effort, too calm to argue with real force. He should have told David, he should have told Robin. So many regrets and so little time.

“Whatever you want to tell me, it can wait until this is back where it belongs.” Her tone is dismissive, clearly unwilling to listen to anything he might have to say while in this condition. Time is up. Hand holding his heart lifts, Regina’s eyes narrowing in concentration as she pushes forward to force the organ back inside his chest. 

In the back of his mind, the darkness laughs.

\--

Screams echo the hallway, loud, masculine cries of agony. They echo around and around the room, filling the space, and it takes Killian a few seconds to even realise what the sound is. Another few to realise it is coming from his own mouth. He is screaming and the world has spun off its axis once more. Mouth snaps shut, sound dying mid scream as he comes back to himself.

Red smoke obscures the doorways and halfway up the stairs, a circle of thick colour that keeps everything outside the charmed circle at bay. Somewhere, Killian can hear banging, a muffled voice crying out for his mother. Henry. A small part of him knows that is Henry and right now, he is out of the way, trapped in another room and so unimportant. The smoke keeps the pain back as well, magical wind picking up to create a small storm, blowing and whipping around hair and clothes.

Dark One stares at Dark One.

Even now, she is beautiful. Ice blond hair is flying freely around her head, the scene reminiscent of the first time she had admitted her feelings, the last time he had truly seen the woman he had loved and not the twisted creature that wears her face. He looks away again.

Regina lies slumped against the bottom steps of the stairs, her eyes closed. It’s funny, but Killian can’t recall how she got there, can remember nothing in the moments between her returning his heart and now. She might be dead. That would be unfortunate. A rather anticlimax end to the so called Evil Queen, and he had hoped to play with her first. Then her chest rises and falls.

His hand is outstretched in her direction, head tilting to the side in a little birdlike motion as he blinks a few times, staring at his arm. 

“You said you were fine!” Emma cries out, pain and yes, anger in her voice. Hurt by his reactions, by his feelings and Killian feels anger in response, hot fury that she always acts as though he was the unreasonable one. He embraces the anger, the fire. After so long of being submerged under the water, ecased in the ice of his own making, it is such a relief to finally feel heat again. No matter that it was negative and directed at Emma, he can feel something once more and so he willingly embraces its molten heat. “You understood, you, you.... I don't understand Hook, you said you were coming to terms with it. You said you weren’t angry.”

“When,” Killian bites out, voice a low hiss, a steam of his own anger and hurt. Regina is completely forgotten now, ignored just as he is still ignoring the sounds on the other side of the smoke. “Did I ever say I was _fine_ about any of this?”

She pauses at that, a small start as her gaze turns inward, as she plays through all the conversations they have had since she told him the truth. All the stories they have shared and the things he has said. The declarations of love from both sides and he watches her face fall, watches green eyes fill with tears as she realises he had never commented on what she had done beyond a plea for time.

Finally, she hears him. All too late. For him, for her, for the rest of this accursed town.

The darkness shudders and stretches inside of him, pouring itself into every pore. He is still on fire, every inch of him is burning, forever burning and the black is eager to get started. 

_Soon_ , he tells it, soothes it. There is so much to do now, so much to prepare for. There is so much fun to be had. _Soon._

It laughs again, gleeful, delirious. Around them, the smoke that is his magic continues to pulseate, but Killian doesn’t know how long that will last. How long he can hold off everything he is feeling, and it will send him right back to his knees until he has had the chance to process everything. He is a bomb and he is primed to explode. Not here. There is too much risk here, too much Emma and she will try and stop his fun. The darkness agrees, has always agreed, the darkness will help now. He will grow strong thanks to it and finally have what he desires above all else. At long last, revenge. Its what hes always wanted. Surely? Emotion is power, emotion is everything and he can use his magic at last. 

Killian bends gracefully, hand finding the hilt of Excalibur once more. So considerate of Emma to have shown him its potential and then leave it here for him to collect. Much better. Red smoke curls around him, transporting him away from the house, away from the anguished look in her eyes, his final mocking words lingering in a sing song tone of voice.

“I’ve got no strings, to hold me down.”


	4. Chapter Four

## 

** Chapter Four **

####  _**thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,  
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body. - Pablo Neruda**_

__  


Clarity of purpose keeps him going, driving him forward. He can’t stop to think, can’t stop for anything because this period of grace granted to him is finite. There are things to do, items to be collected before the pain rushes back in. The darkness has not forgiven or forgotten the way it has been denied for so long and it is hungry for its pound of flesh. First from him and then the town. This will not last, he has mere moments and so he presses on.

The basement is his first stop, appearing briefly to collect all the spell ingredients, along with the book. It represents countless hours of work between the two of them as Emma laboured to undo her mistake. More than that, it represents his servitude, it represents a threat to his new found power. It wouldn’t do to leave such little trinkets lying around where anyone might find them and put them to some sort of use. Killian has some much more inventive ideas on how make use of this, red smoke magic spiriting them away. The book is taken as well, just to make sure nobody can recreate the idea. 

There is no Zelena chained up here as Emma has implied. Thought passes out of his head almost as soon as he makes it, noting that Henry and Regina must have freed her - it certainly would explain the cuff they had managed to get their hands on at just the right time. What a pair of bleeding hearts they make, willing to uncuff such a dangerous creature. What could Zelena have possibly said to make Regina trust her enough? Or perhaps it was simply the enemy of my enemy. An idea sparks in his mind, something to consider carefully later, when he is not in the enemy’s stronghold. 

He has to keep moving, letting the magic lead the way. The darkness whispers to him, words incomprehensible on their own, nothing he could repeat out loud but he feels more knowledgeable with every hissed sound, letting it guide him as it wills.

(A small part of Killian knows he shouldn’t allow the darkness to take control like this.

The bigger part of him can’t really remember why.)

He is outside seconds later, but still within the grounds of her house. The door in front of him is locked, sealed with magic that is child's play to him now, flicking it open with little more than a twist of his wrist as he strides forward. 

Dreamcatchers shift slightly in the non existent breeze, a gentle tinkle sound as they almost greet him softly. Eyes widen, staring up at them in surprise. He has never stepped foot in here before, Emma had never needed him to and so he had never felt the need. Now, all Killian can do is stare in near wonder at the sight in front of him. There are so many. All those memories that must be singing there, from so many people. So many moments hidden away here and are they only from Camelot? She could have stolen any moment she pleases. He could steal any moment he pleases now, tongue peeking out to wet his lips in anticipation and delight at the thought. 

The rattling speeds up as he reaches up to snag a random one, almost giddy with delight, with the idea of all the memories. He can peek inside any of them if he so desires it. His life is suddenly filled with an abundance of choice, a staggering amount of it that steals his breath away. Killian doesn’t even know how to start picking which choice to focus on, let alone making a choice. It is dizzying, all the possibilities now on show to him. 

Staring at the dreamcatcher shivering slightly in his hand, Killian suddenly realizes that they might have a problem. Emma remembers Camelot still. She might be without Excalibur and currently without her magic, but she remembers what he did. More than that, she knows what deal he made and what the darkness expects in return. 

“She thinks she knows what our plan is. She remembers our aim.” Killian isn’t really sure why he is speaking the words aloud, slight wince on his face at how hoarse he sounds, voice scratchy and wrong. The presence that lurks in his mind is always there, always listening to his thoughts and he doesn't have to be vocal to have a conversation with it. He feels it stretch itself a little further, wrapping itself around every stray thought and idea that forms in his mind. With every passing second, it is becoming more than just a part of him - it is him down to the soul, and soon there will be no Killian and Darkness. Just Darkness.

A low level concern buzzes in the back of his mind, worry that Emma might ruin their plans. She wants the same thing as he does but he also knows how very stubborn she is. She is fixated on the idea of ‘saving’ him and so she will ignore the whispers. She will attempt to thwart his plans. Killian bares his teeth at shadows in the corner of his vision as the worry grows. He cannot kill her, she is immortal just like him.

(He will not even try to kill her.)

Then again, he doesn’t need to. So she would try and stop him. Let her try. All he needs to do is keep her on the back foot, keep her distracted until it is too late. Until she has no choice but to give in and let him save her. In a manner of speaking.

“It’s simple. We change the game.” Dreamcatchers vanish with his words, power rushing through him and it burns a little with every use of his newly unleashed power. Every flash and press of magic turns a little bit more of himself to ash. It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore. He shouldn’t still exist and the world is breaking upon the reality that he does. 

Movements are a little less steady now, steps hindered by the pain that shoots through his body with every attempt to get closer to the house. Killian is the master of torturing himself, and becoming so powerful has not changed that skill or the self destructive urges that drive him to those ends. The voices urge haste, that he should leave now while he can but his attention is drawn hopelessly to the front door which is still open from his entrance. It feels like an age ago that he had charged through that door, intent on stopping whatever was threatening Swan. Back when he was a completely different man. 

Jerky movements grow stronger, mentally battling his body as he forces himself to step forward, back towards the porch and the small group he had left behind minutes ago. Breathing becomes more and more laboured as he moves, struggling to cross the grass. Hand reaches out to grab at the side of the house, palm pressing against the grey coloured woodwork for added support. He can hear muffled voices coming from the open door. Emma and Henry are through that door and he feels a stab of pain at the sound of his famil-

_They are not your family! They betrayed you! You were nothing more than a plaything to her, and a means to an end to him. They seek to control you, to use you, they always have._

His own control is slipping, a tremble running along his hand and making the rings bounce against his fingers. Not yet. He can’t give in to the fire completely yet. Just a few seconds more. If he breaks down here, he will be caught and then everything they hope to achieve will vanish. Hand curls into a fist as he fights down the shakes, the tremer spreading throughout his whole body. Leg starts to bounce a little, a nervous movement that sets the sword by his side vibrating slightly. Emma will regain control of Excalibur and him, if he loses control here. Things will go back to the way they had before and nobody will be happy. 

Nobody is happy now, that is true. Nothing is happy except possibly the darkness. 

The tremble vanishes at that thought. A split second later, he follows suit, a broken door and the stolen items the only hint he had remained longer than they saw.

\--

Pressure builds up behind his eyes.

His whole head feels as though it has been placed into some kind of clamp, and it is now squeezing down, harder and harder. He is sinking into deep waters and paying the price accordingly. Killian half falls out of the smoke, magic depositing him on some random street in the town. Houses line it on both sides, most dark and quiet. A few have a couple of lights on, pinpricks of warmth dotted along the street but otherwise it is empty and still. 

Finally, Killian and the darkness are alone. 

Pressure and pain increases, spreading across his whole form, while his thoughts tumble over each other in panic. He was a Dark One now, he was a monster, a thing of myth and despair. He really was the thing mothers warned their children about. He was so much more than Captain Hook now. He was so much less. All Killian can focus on however, is Emma’s betrayal of his dying wish, the hurt magnified so much more than when he first found out about it because for the first time he can actually feel his own emotions.

How could she do this to him, how could she do this to him, how could she. Howcouldshehowcouldshehowco-

He screams. 

Across the street, one of the few lit houses is suddenly plunged into darkness, every light exploding at the same time as his emotions surge violently.

Too near, he is still too near, suffocating under the weight of the inky blackness. It is sinking into his mouth and pouring itself greedily down his throat, clamping down on every thought and feeling that isn’t this agony. It hurts, the burning tracing along all the many veins in his body, creating what feels like endless passages of pain and he needs to let it out. 

The horseless carriage next to him catches fire as he staggers to the side, Killian reaching out to try and find some support. With a muttered curse, he pulls his hand back, eyeing the unintended destruction he has already managed to create. Voices laugh in delight at the sight, instantly greedy for more. For pain and blood and screams and it is the baser elements of the darkness in control now. The ones that act without thought or subtly, that seek only the screams of the dying and the terrified, averted gaze. The fire is intoxicating, a few moments where he is truly lost to the simple feelings before colder, more cynical aspects of his new personality fight to the forefront. 

The bonfire he has created out of the metal contraption is bound to be beacon to those looking for him, panic swirling in his mind and adding to the heady mix of negative emotions that is already alight in his mind. With the last of his conscious strength, he forces himself away from the rapidly smouldering wreck, the once pristine vehicle already little more than a burnt out blackened wreck.

(Like his heart. Like his love. Like his life.)

The desire to get away from here is focused on, magnified as best he can to step through the smoke and reappear on another street, thankfully as quiet and as empty as the first had originally been.

Excalibur is roughly pulled from the shealth he had made for it without thought, sword dancing up and down, the tip vibrating in the air. Breath is little more than awkward gasps, jagged cuts of air as he stares down at the sword. It feels as though his whole body is shaking with the weapon as he fights to focus on it properly, the glamour spell fading in moments. There it is. Next to her name, there is his own, in black and silver. 

‘Killian Jones’. 

Well, he had wanted to see his name written there, the dark patterns curling around the name. Taunting him, and Killian screams again, a sound of impotent fury against the world as a whole. Against what she has made him into. The singing increases in tempo, its whispery tones filling every aspect of him. 

Hand lifts to press against his head, as if he can somehow block out the noise and pain. Dimly, Killian feels himself fall to his knees, the heavy landing sending a faint shockwave of pain through his body. Eyes are tightly screwed shut against the onslaught which only builds and builds, far beyond any kind of threshold he could have reasonably imagined himself capable of coping with. The sensation of something hot and wet trickles down his face, twin lines from his eyes to his chin. He can only hope it is tears and not blood.

Screams ring out again and again, sound growing increasingly ragged as his throat rips and tears, vocal cords wearing thin. He screams until he has no voice left and then screams some more, mouth open in a futile attempt to try and expel his anguish through a sound that has been worn away.

Finally unable to do anything else, he simply gives into the pain and blackness, lets his subconscious transfer him back to that dreaded vault and the magic transfer him where it pleases. 

\--

It is only fitting, that he finds himself standing in the graveyard once the mists lift, standing in the center of a burnt circle of grass. The bringer of death taking a moment to check out the end before he gets down to business and he has to appreciate the humour in subconsciously coming here. First though, these clothes have to go. They remind him too much of the before, of the Killian Jones he had once been. The one who has loved and lost. Who has tried to fit into a world that quite simply was not his to be a part of. 

He is not of this realm. He had never been taken by the first curse, he didn’t have memories on how things functioned without magic. This whole time he has been stumbling along relying on the guidance on Swan and hoping he wasn’t making a total arse of himself the whole time. It all came so easily to the rest, even Robin managed to get a better handle on this place. Nobody remembered that he didn’t understand talking phones properly, or that Swan was forever tossing references out deliberately knowing he would be confused. She had always enjoyed quoting things he didn’t recognize. Sometimes, Emma even showed him the origin of her reference. If he had been a very good boy. At the time, he had found it cute, thought she had found it cute, one of the quirks that gave their relationship meaning.

Now, he can’t help but feel she did it to assert her superiority over him, her control. She used it to show him and the rest of the world that she was the one in charge, that she was the one lowering her standards to let a stupid, pathetic pirate share her bed. Emma loved him, he still does not doubt that, but maybe not in the way he had once hoped, not as equals but perhaps it was a love for a master towards a favoured pet. Maybe their love wasn’t real and true after all. Maybe she saved him just for that control. Who else was going to be her slave if he was gone? 

Such mauldin thoughts are not to be born, Killian ruthlessly squashing down on them. He is not built for self pity, he has always known he is pathetic, weak, a lesser man. He knows and accepts his limitations He knows full well that he is a curse upon those he loves, something broken and rotten. Killian has had that reinforced every time someone abandons him as they will inevitably do. 

(His father had willingly abandoned him, unlike the rest but it doesn’t change the sting, the pain of thinking of Liam or Milah leaving him. Abandoning him to a world that grew darker and colder at their passing. There are some days he hates them for going.)

Even Emma abandoned him. Left him to the tender mercies of the darkness for hours, left him with nothing but a crocodile for company as day turned to night. Only in the darkness itself did she come for him, as if his Emma had no idea where the vault was. He had never asked her what had taken her so long after the change, some part of him afraid of the answer and the lie she would no doubt spin around him. How she would justify even that as she tossed him scraps from her table, her little pet Dark One, complete with shiny hidden tether.

No. He will not wallow now, not when he is so close to victory. With a snap of his fingers, clothes start to shift and change, rejecting this world in favour of his own once more. The leather coat thickens, spreading to unfurl down to his ankles like a sail. It’s more ornate than his old, pirate one yet still reminds him of that. Deep black like the sky without a star in it. It seems to swallow the light, the few hints of silver buckling and metal embellishments standing out all the more in stark contrast. Hand lifts to run through hair that once more appears to have taken on a life of its own, sticking up wildly with no rhyme or reason. 

Finally, he feels like his old, villainous self again. 

“Much better,” he murmurs to himself, smile fading for a moment as he remembers the last time he had used magic to create an outfit. It had been very similar to this one. 

The demon had enjoyed the look then too. 

A fugitive glance around shows no sign of his demon. It’s a temporary reprieve - after all, how much of an escape can it truly be when the thing is a figment of his own mind. But it is a moment he will take nevertheless, allowing his attention to fully take in his surroundings. 

He's been to the Storybrooke cemetery once or twice. One graveyard is much like another, the variation being in the money and time spent on the memorials - this one is decent enough. It is a farsight better than the sad little beach in Neverland, wooden crosses dotting the surface where so many of his crew had been laid to rest. Mr Smee carved the crosses, most roughly made, some little more than two twigs bound together by twine. Enough to be able to hang a small scrap of wood off with a name, something to record the person who lay below.

They were the lucky ones, the ones they had been able to recover and bury safely, the ones they had the luxury of creating crosses for and taking a moment to mourn. Burial at sea wasn’t the same when there were mermaids out there, forever hungry. He refused to subject the mortal remains of his men to yet another indignity like that and so the beach graveyard was born, although it was not the only place that held the remains of those crewmembers he had lost. If he were to draw a map of Neverland, he could mark the grave of everyone he had left behind on that cursed island, could name them all, no matter where he buried them. But he can’t recall their faces. In a way, the selective amnesia is almost a blessing, only their names taunting him in the dark. 

There is still a chest in the hold of the Jolly Roger from their time in Neverland. Small, little more than a box really, hand carved by one of the crew, a man named Peterson. He had been one of the first to die, dead in a skirmish with some Lost Boys. He lies buried only a couple of hundred meters from where they had made camp the first night on the search for Henry. It had been impossible to retrieve the body, Lost Boys driving them off with every attempt made. In the end, the best Killian had been able to do was push the rotting corpse into a natural ditch and cover it in leaves, letting nature do the rest of the work.

His final failure towards the man who had trusted Killian to be his Captain. It didn't matter that he had returned years later with a cross, name proudly attached. Or that he had been able to fill the ditch in with sand and dirt, to cover the rotting remains properly, trying not to see the half gnawed bones and scraps of mostly eaten flesh. It hadn’t changed the simple fact that he had failed everyone who sailed with him, that he couldn’t even give his men decent burial.

Pan and his manic followers had made it quite clear that for whatever twisted reason, Peterson was not to be moved, no matter how many jobs and favours Captain Hook had completed.

Killian kept the chest to remember. He filled it all the crosses that had been made over time, more than enough for the remaining crew members even as they slowly dwindled. On his more depressing days, he even adds to the names. Just in case. So he can always remember. Names of those he has already lost and the names of those he fears to, grounding himself in the idea that they are always with him. 

(There is no cross in that chest for him. For any of the various names that he has gone by during his long life. He has always planned for an unmarked grave.)

_A shame Pan is already dead_ , the darkness muses, slipping back into his mind as though it had never left. It probably had never left, and was letting his thoughts turn morbid, better to power itself. It is a shame the little demon had died without Killian having been able to sink his hook into him as he had dreamed of doing for so long. At least he had been privileged enough to witness it. Along with watching his life’s mission come to fruition - although again, he was denied the pleasure of being the one to stab and kill Rumpelstiltskin. There had been countless nights after that, during the year without her, that he had consoled himself with replaying that moment over and over again. To try and weigh the victory against the loss of a woman he had never had. His failure that year was not embracing who had truly was, but trying to remain in some limbo between the two, to try and be worthy of her impossible ideals even as he betrayed them by his evil actions. Maybe he even deserves Rumplestiltskin’s return.

The man was worse than a cockroach. People called him a survivor but he had to admit he had nothing on that thing. He had stabbed him in Manhattan and believed him dead. Had watched him sacrifice himself to destroy Pan and still the crocodile managed to come back. 

Thanks to Baelfire, and Killian help but feel some anger at that, at once again losing someone he cared about because of that monster. Why had he let Baelfire leave the hospital that day? He knew that the price had to be so dark, he had seen the mark burnt into the palm of his hand and yet Killian had still let him walk out of the hospital after a hug and a few words of reconciliation. He had been so desperate for human warmth, to be needed that he had let himself be bought with such simple tokens and ignored what logically he had known to be true.

Pathetic. And Baelfire had paid the price for his weakness.

Pent up frustration threatens to spill out, the grass underfoot slowly turning a darker and darker shade of green, so dark it was almost black. 

_There are still others within this land who had once been Lost Boys. Ones that took part in the petty humiliations Pan inflicted on you._ After hearing it mock, belittle and try and tempt him all this time, it is something of a shock to hear it almost... sympathetic. To try and offer its own twisted type of comfort.

_We know all your pain. Let us ease it Hook._ Images conjured by the voices in his head rise in his mind, faces flash by. The Lost Boys who had made his ship unclean by coming aboard and were now living in this land without having to face the consequences of all their evil deeds. He could punish them. Inflict agony on them for all the slights, murder and humiliation Pan had done to him. He could have his vengeance on everyone.

They didn’t want to be like the little demon anymore. It doesn’t excuse the actions that they had taken during their unnaturally long childhood of course but since coming to this land they had not shown any particularly murderous tendencies and there doesn’t seem much sport or enjoyment to be had from hurting those who have become children once more. The darkness shifts a little, a faint tendril of concern sinking into his awareness, disliking the idea that he might not want to hurt those who had hurt him. 

_Or later we could return to Neverland. Think of all the monsters there, the ones who fed most eagerly from Pan. They deserve to be punished. After our business is concluded here._

After. After he finally gets to make the crocodile pay.

The presence in him settles back down, satisfied his focus is back on those who have hurt him, those who made him into this. With a lazy wave of his hand, he forms a brand new gravestone, blank stone ripe with all the potential. Smirk twitches onto lips as he creates text, forming names and letting them rotate through. David Nolan. Regina Mills. Henry Mills. Robin Hood. Emma Sw- no, not that one. Mary Margaret Blanchard. Or should that be simply Snow White. The game grows dull after a while without anyone else to witness it. There is no enjoyment to be had from their reaction when nobody knows he is even doing it. He turns from the grave, leaving it still formed there before pausing to bite lightly at his lower lip. It would be a shame to simply leave it without picking an actual name. Just in case someone came up here in the last few days the town had. Rumplestiltskin perhaps. No. No, when he is through with him, there will not be enough left of the insect to bury. And there will be nobody to want to raise a monument to his memory. 

(If he goes through with his revenge.)

No, Rumplestiltskin will not do as a statement of intent. Killian doesn’t need a stone marker to shout to the world that he is going to kill that pathetic creature. Someone else then. Someone that will hurt Emma if she comes across it. Thumb brushes over his bottom lip a couple of times as he stares at it in deep thought. So many choices and only one space. It wouldn’t have the same effect if he filled the whole area with all the possible names although Killian can’t pretend it wouldn’t make him laugh. He gives a wave of his hand, picking the first name he had conjured. David Nolan. 

New entertainment has to be sought now that is done and for some reason he isn’t quite prepared to leave here right now. He amuses himself by wandering the stones, wondering how many of them are actually real. There was nothing here before Regina had cast her dark curse as far as anyone seems to know. Which surely means most of these graves were created at that time, scenery to set the stage. And since they were living the same day over and over, he doubts that many of them died. The names are mostly generic, as if plucked from a book and it only adds to his belief that this is all set dressing. Part of the Evil Queen’s games and nothing more. Feet slow, all but dragging them as he finds himself heading towards one grave in particular, one he knows is real. One grave he has tried his very best not to look at the whole time he was here. If he is honest, the one grave that is the whole reason he hasn’t been ready to leave the cemetery just yet. 

Beloved Son. Neal Cassidy. 

The tips of his fingers reach out to brush against the very edge of the stonework, tracing the headstone revelantly. It feels like only yesterday that he had stood here and watched the casket be lowered into the ground. Only a few breaths before that when the lad had truly been a lad, when he had been on the Jolly Roger with him. Killian almost missed that time, those brief moments when he had been as close to happy as he could have possibly been. Even with the threat of Pan lurking around, things had been simpler then. Easier. Until they had betrayed each other and caused new scars on their souls. The ache of loss didn’t fade away completely, no matter how much time passed. He ached at the thought of this lost little boy, at all the ways he had failed him.

He should have visited Baelfire more often, but there had always been the worry that his visit would coincide with a visit from the crocodile, that it would descend into a fight and Baelfire deserves better than such a thing. His heart contracts painfully at the idea that such disrespect could have occured in this spot most of all. There had been so much Killian had wanted to say to him and yet had never allowed himself the chance.

(Truthfully, Killian can't stand the idea that Rumplestiltskin might have been here at the same time, showing grief. Seeing him in pain and knowing it was to do with the boy they had both cared for would have been a hollow victory at best. It was something else he shared with his mortal enemy, the love they had for this man. They both cared for so many of the same people. Not that Killian can bring himself to really admit it.

His demon is best when he convinces himself Gold is a pure monster without any redeeming features or emotions, when he reminds himself of the bad things and not the idea that Rumplestiltskin might be capable of showing pain and grief.)

“Hello Baelfire.” Killian greeting is soft, thoughts of the boy he had once cared for driving the darkness to the outer reaches of his mind. Now that he is here, Killian finds himself at a loss of what to say, a soft and pained sigh slipping from his lips as he examines the stone carefully. Maybe the answer is written in those four words. Maybe not.

“What would you say eh mate if you could see me now? I suppose you must have worried I would end up like this, although I imagine you were more concerned about your papa’s fate.”

Despite everything the monster had done, Baelfire had still tried to find a way to forgive him, to make some kind of relationship with him. The chance had been brief but it had been there. In the final reckoning, he had even been prepared to give up his own life, for the sake of his father.

It's a measure of forgiveness that Killian knows he has never been capable of and never will be.

(He had been so close to forgiving his own father his sins, for everything he had done to Killian. For lying to him, for selling him, for running away and leaving his innocent son to face the penalty of his crimes. He could have forgiven his father all that.

But to insult Liam’s memory, to replace him with another that was something beyond forgiveness.

He hadn't sought to replace Killian, clearly not considering his middle child worthy of even feigned remembrance.)

A final sigh slips from his lips as he half turns from the grave, breaking the physical contact of fingers to stone. There are no answers to be found here, nothing he can say to mute stone that could possibly matter or change a thing. It is an effort to pull himself away from Baelfire and the past. It’s siren call promises escape of a sort, to lose himself in those memories but it would mean abandoning the now. Baelfire deserved better than what he had got, in the end another of the crocodiles victims. Another one for Killian to extract revenge for. 

(He knows in his heart that Baelfire would never have wanted this. Not to see his father dead or Killian to be the one to do it. But the lad is gone and it doesn’t matter what the dead want, not anymore.)

“I miss you lad. And I’m sorry for everything.” 

He wanted to be Baelfire’s father. Instead all he managed to be was the same kind of father to the boy, as his own had been to him. 

Killian has never really needed this darkness to be a monster. He manages that quite well all on his own. 

\--

Storybrooke is quiet as he strolls through the streets, sticking to the ones that lead to nowhere in particular. He has no destination in mind, simply moving for the sake of it, passing across the area almost restlessly. Everywhere seems to be sleeping, peaceful almost but then Killian knows that it is a false peace. The whole town is holding its breath as it waits for the storm to break overhead. He is waiting too, for some kind of sign from the demon or perhaps just for Emma.

It isn’t until he sees the long dark wavy hair and a pale face that the darkness shifts in his mind. It seems as though there had been a purpose in his wanderings after all, his feet having taken him to the humble abode of one Belle French. There she was, head bent over some notes in a leather bound book as she walks along the street, oblivious to her newly acquired dark shadow. 

The wave of emotion that rises in him is enough to make his whole body burn once more. Belle. The one person left in all the realms that his enemy cared for. The final thing that could be torn away from him and an added layer of pain delivered. He wets suddenly dry lips with his tongue as he considers this, considers how he has tried to hurt Belle before - he has hurt Belle before - all to hurt the monster. It had worked as well, and Killian had drawn such pleasure from those moments, from the sounds Rumplestiltskin had made. The voices in his head shiver with delight, with anticipation as they too recall the moment, the dark and savage glee at knowing the man was suffering a fraction of the agony Killian had gone through. It had been such a rush and he has the chance now to feel that again.

“Belle.” It takes him a second to realise the voice calling out to her is his own, Killian blinking rapidly as he comes to a stop, fighting with the urge to keep moving. Not yet. It wants that and he doesn’t know what he wants. Control over himself feels so tenuous right now, Killian struggling to keep the darkness in check, from just surging forward and snapping her little neck. Leaving her all laid out like a present for his nemesis to find. No. No, that is too quick and he isn’t sure if he wants that. Belle is his friend. Perhaps it should be, Belle was his friend.

_The first step for your revenge is right here Hook._ It is so tempting, so easy and he is so weak. He takes a single small step forward despite himself as she turns around.

He expects to see fear, terror maybe even pity on Belle’s face. Something that betrayed her disgust at what had become of him, how far he had fallen. He was supposed to save Emma, not follow her into the darkness only to find out he had already been living there. He was supposed to spend the rest of his life fighting to find a way to remove the darkness not dive into those waters himself.

“Killian!” Her gasp is one of pain, shock but not fear. No terror or even pity. There is no fear in her eyes and Killian doesn’t understand. Belle should be afraid of him, he is a monster now. Why isn’t she afraid of him? Why does she look at him with empathy? She moves towards him purposely, but the worry he can see blazing in her eyes is directed outwards towards him, not inwards aimed at herself. She isn't afraid of him and this is more than courage, more than some strange streak of stubborness.

“What happened to your eyes? They are so... bloody.”

Her hand lifts to his cheek, Killian instinctively taking a step backwards out of shock, making sure there is no physical contact between them. The darkness hisses in disappointment. Now that she mentions it, he can feel two trails of something dried on his cheeks, tracing a journey from his eyes to his beard. Vaguely he remembers thinking he had cried before and hoping it had not been blood. Like everything else in his life, so much for hope. 

The blood on his face should be an important thing to focus on. It’s not what he finds himself thinking about though, instead blankly staring at Belle as the uncomfortable truth starts to dawn. 

She doesn’t know.

“Emma... Emma didn't tell you?” He speaks the words low, without passion as he tries to wrap his mind around the idea that Swan hadn’t thought it worthwhile to warn Belle that the Captain was on the loose and finally armed with what he needed to get his revenge. Surely she knows him well enough to realise that the first thing he is going to do is try and kill his crocodile. He’s gone after Belle before and once, he had even regretted his actions. Regretted shooting her because it had been too quick, too easy and in the end, he thinks her relationship with the monster had only grown stronger because of it. 

Dark Ones do not feel regret over attempted murder - aside from it only being attempted instead of successful murder.

(He still regrets the pain he had caused her, dark thoughts and feelings be damned.)

They stand a few feet from each other, would be killer and innocent victim. She’s like a little lamb to the slaughter. And Emma hadn’t warned her. 

_Seems like she doesn’t know you at all_ the darkness muses. _Or maybe she thinks you’re better than all this? Maybe she’s testing you._

Emma hadn’t told Belle and spared Killian from this moment. Perhaps he would enjoy revealing himself to the crocodile, getting to see his reaction first hand, the gloating moments as Killian had everything and it had nothing. Yes, Killian would have enjoyed that, but he doesn’t enjoy knowing he is going to be the one to break Belle yet again, to shatter her fragile trust in someone else. So many people have betrayed her - some over and over again. He can find no pleasure in adding himself to that list once more. 

Belle frowns, lips pursing together with worry that he can almost see grow by the second, with each passing moment that they stand face to face.

She kisses the crocodile with that mouth. She forgave him all his crimes. She forgave the fact he murdered Milah. She knew it and she forgave it. Tossed Killian’s pain aside as if it were nothing, unimportant. She doesn’t deserve his kindness. 

_Maybe Emma wants you to do this. Forgiveness over permission dearie._

“Emma didn't tell you what she did to me...” words are almost aimed at himself instead of her, feeling as though his brain was being particularly slow right now. A dull ache starts to spread across his temples, and talking to her was a mistake. Letting this moment linger on is an even worse mistake. 

“Tell me what? Killian are you alright?” Her concern hurts more than any amount of hate or fear would have done. 

_Take her_ , the darkness nudges, tone impatient. _Your crocodile’s woman, this is too perfect to pass up._

Grimace passes across his features, the words growing hotter and almost painful. It would be so easy to take Belle right now. He wouldn’t even have to touch her, the magic can do all the work for him. He could banish her to another place, he could kill her with a flick of his wrist, break her delicate little neck. It could be slower, more painful. Enchant a shell so that Gold could hear her screams and be unable to save her. Fingers twitch, iching to form the motions, to conjure something. Anything.

_Take her. Hurt her. Kill her. Do something with her Hook, you might not get another chance._

“Shut up,” he growls, eyes darting to try and catch a glimpse out of it in the corner of his vision. His thoughts do not seem wholly his own, ideas of torture? He has always favoured a clean cut. Some taunting before perhaps but the end was always fairly clean and above all simple. Sword or hook.

“Killian?”

“Not you,” he snaps, frustration building with his headache, and of course not her. How could she be so stupid as to think he was talking to her? 

The street light down the road crackles and pops, plunging the area to a dimmer state. The whole air around them feels charged, static just waiting for a match. 

“Killian. What did Emma do to you?” Words are spoken slowly, evenly - too evenly he realises with a start.

She knows. Somehow, she now knows. Her back is as straight as a rod and he can see a small sliver of fear in her eyes. It cuts him to the quick to see him afraid of her, even as it also delights him. Belle doesn’t run. She’s smart and brave and too good for this end. Killian bites lightly at his bottom lip before replying, a tiny sting of pain keeping him grounding in the moment.

“She made me into a Dark One.” It is the first time he has spoken the fact aloud, the words bitter and ugly on his tongue. Somehow speaking them seems to be a struggle, giving into this new identity that he still didn’t want. Instead of running, Belle tries to step forward again with that same damnable concern on her face, Killian once again shrinking from her touch. He doesn’t want to hurt her. He won’t. He won’t.

“Stay away from me!” 

“Keep... keep out of my way Lass,” Killian adds between pants, and he can feel the disapproval of the darkness pressing down on him, threatening to suffocate him once more. He forces himself to stand tall, to fight against the voices that have risen to a near din, a screech of noise in violent protest. Hand lifts, limb shaking slightly to point at her, schooling his expression into something stern.

_No! No! Kill her! Make the street run red with her blood! Taste her fear! Let it give you strength!_

“Next time we meet I will go through you if I have to for what I want. Do not stand in my way Belle. You were kind to me once so... you have this warning... you... will not get another.”

\--

Punishment for defying the darkness is not long in coming. 

It flickers and smolders in his mind as he steps through the entrance to Zelena’s old farmhouse, a growling presence that sets him on edge. It reminds him of a wounded animal just waiting to lash out, and he cannot help but fear what might come. Killian knows only too well how sharp its fangs and claws are.

It waits though and so he carries on. All he has left, is to carry on and wait for the hammer to fall. The farmhouse is the perfect hiding place, a selection of charms and enchantments already set up that he can build upon to make them powerful enough to block any magic that searches or tries to enter from a distance. It will even look like Zelena’s magic from a distance, and so a glance will make them think it was left over from her time here. No doubt they will look for him on the Jolly Roger, and so he stays away from his beloved ship. He is not a simpleton, he knows how to fight battles, he knows how to distract and flank an enemy. It will not take them long to work out he is here, but it will take them longer, and that difference may be all the time he needs. Or so he hopes. 

Lingering traces of Zelena are scattered around as well, things he has been able to scavenge, magical items of use. Some part of him wonders what he will do if she decides to come back here, as she surely eventually will. Killing her would be such a waste. It is a worry for another time, if it has to happen at all.

All the spell ingredients and book he removed from Emma’s care lie across the kitchen table with his newer finds. So many possibilities and he really should decide what to do with them. All the spells and curses he now has knowledge of, all the things he could cast. An idea sparks in his mind as he flicks through the book, eyes falling on a particular potion, something he could use on Belle.

“You were always a potential successor to Rumplestiltskin you know.” The demon’s voice suddenly intrudes into his thoughts, having waited for him to lower his guard, to be distracted before it struck.

“I thought the Dark One was immortal. Why would you even worry about a successor?” Killian can’t help himself, can’t help but respond even though he knows that is just want the darkness wants, that interacting with it will only cause himself more pain.

“Ah, but that's where they always get it wrong dearie,” the demon informs him, grin growing ever wicked. It lifts a finger, wagging it in his face, voice taking on a lecturing tone. “The _Darkness_ is immortal, the vessel is just where we currently live. But don’t worry, part of you will be immortal, the poor fool who kills you will have to put up with your charming face by their side for their tenure and then so on and so on.” it pauses, giving him chance to digest the information before slyly carrying on, a knowing smirk on its features.

“It’s why we convinced your crocodile to spare you that day. Oh yes, it’s thanks to us you live. Death is too good for him, we whispered. Death is too quick. Leave him to suffer, let him linger.” It closes its eyes, licking its lips as the demon recalls that particular memory. “We add to the darkness in the world as much as we can, we feed off it, but when we find someone with so much... potential well they deserve something special.”

Killian swallows heavily, adam's apple bobbing up and down in his throat and try as he might, he couldn’t help but let the words take seed in his mind, thoughts instantly twisting and turning as he tortured himself with this new information.

Had he been truly damned all those years ago? Had he really been considered a candidate to become darkness incarnate when he was nothing more than Captain Jones, pirate yes, scoundrel yes, but whole still, lighter, not burdened by an unending hate. 

Maybe this had been his destiny all along and these brief years in the embrace of the saviour and the hope of redeeming himself had merely delayed the inevitable for a short while.

“Then you vanished for all those years and we rather forgot about you.” It was still talking, breezily speaking as if its words hadn’t sent him reeling. Layering wound upon wound. 

“Your potential was nothing weighed against the possibility of being free from the tether of course, but after that failed we saw your original use burning even brighter. Have you ever wondered why he didn’t just kill you in this town? How easy it would have been for him, for us? Why he let you live when he could have taken your ship and tried to save the boy without you? We wanted you Hook.” Form shifts, shimmers, and even though he knows what is coming, he can’t help the flinch that runs through him as Swan stands in its place, a perfect replica. 

“We saw your potential dearie, as clear as we saw your pain.” The Emma demon steps closer, hand lifting to hover against his cheek as she whispers, voice a seductive purr that sends tingles down his spine. It doesn't matter that this isn't his Emma, it looks and sounds like her, it knows how much he he hungers for her even now. How much she affects him. How weak he truly is.

He knows it, and she - it - knows it as well, ruby red lips curling into a disdainful smile. Her hand drifts lower, always hovering an inch away from skin it cannot touch. Breath catches in his throat as his eyes close and this replica even smells like her.

“So weak. The perfect tool. You may have stopped yourself today but it won’t happen again. Don’t you understand by now? We always get what we desire.”

\--

“Evening Mate.” Voice is as brittle as broken glass, cracking underfoot. It speaks to something old and worn, something ancient. He enjoys the way Robin Hood is startled by the sound of his words, the tiny jump of shoulders betraying his surprise, just as he is impressed by how that is the only evidence that his appearance surprised the other man. It is a strange mix of the two worlds that Robin presents, dressed in this realms clothing and yet still armed with his bow and arrows, quiver firmly strapped to his back.

Robin’s is a strong soul. He wants to break that strength, crush it into dust like a heart. No. It wants that, it wants pain and blood and misery. He wants... he wants. He isn’t exactly sure what he wants in this second, not right now. There had been a desire in his mind. He sought Robin out for a reason but faced with him now, it is gone like leaves on the wind. 

Killian can almost hear the cogs whirl and spin within the other man’s head as he tries to work out how the pirate had managed to sneak up on him without being detected. While Snow could probably give Robin a run for tracking prey in the woods, for hunting and avoiding capture, the man made a living in the woods. He survived by being able to tell when someone was coming up on him and yet Killian had managed to get right behind him before he knew. Killian had cheated of course, but that was a surprise still to be revealed. There isn’t outright hate on his features yet. Just wariness, uncertainty as Robin tries to work out what Killian wants. Or perhaps it should be what Emma wants, as if he is no threat outside of his love life. That will soon change. It is clear that Robin has no real idea who - what - he is facing right now. He is standing in front of a pirate in full Enchanted Wood garb - although admittedly Killian has cast a glamour over his eyes, not wanting that part of his appearance to distract from his purpose - and Robin doesn’t find that the slightest bit off?

First Belle, now Robin. A Dark One could start to get an inferiority complex.

“Really, does nobody in this bloody town talk to each other? I have to say I’m insulted to not be considered worthy of a town meeting.” Irritation is only party an act, some small part of him annoyed that nobody seemed to consider him a threat. They were too used to the neutered version of Captain Hook as if he wasn’t a villain and that simply wouldn’t do at all. He sighs dramatically, making a point to look around the empty streets. “Where is a loud mouthed dwarven fellow when you need one?”

“Killian, what are you talking about?”

“Oh well, I suppose this will work just as well.” Killian gives a relaxed shrug as he speaks, smile one of a predator. Robin can clearly recognize the look as well, the other man’s fingers twitching for a moment as he reaches up to pull an arrow from his back, to nock it in the bow in one fluid motion.  
“I know you can’t help yourself, so I’m sorry but I will defend myself,” Robin warned, arrow aimed at Killian’s shoulder. A clear statement of intent that he sought to wound and incapacitate over a kill shot. Weakness. Emotional weakness that made Robin lack that killer edge he needed to survive this encounter. 

_How sweet_ , the darkness purred, tone deeply amused by this turn of events. _He thinks he can stop us. Let’s show him how wrong he is dearie._

The sound of heels dashing lightly against concrete has him tensing slightly, attention narrowing on the person behind him, taking in every little noise he can pick up on. It sounds like a match is being lit, a very faint whooshing sound following a split second later. Killian twists faster than a human should be able to react, easily dodging out of the way of the fireball that flies harmlessly to the side of him. At the same time he pivots on his heel gracefully to face the newcomer, that same predator like smile on his lips. 

“Hello Regina.”

If looks could kill, Killian is pretty sure he would be nothing but ash right now, her eyes alight with fury. The molten darkness in him sees a lot he knows in her - it's no wonder the darkness had tried to claim her for its own. A dark Queen. Now there really would be a sight.

(There is already a Dark Queen, his Queen, his Swan. Nobody else could ever hold a candle to her or the pain her actions inflict.)

“Stay the hell away from him,” she snarls, another fireball tossed, another he easily ducks to avoid.

“You cuffed the wrong monster your majesty and I’m afraid you have to be punished for that. Can’t have you laying a hand on my Swan and robbing me of the pleasure.” He remembers even if she doesn't, what she did to Swan in Camelot, he remembers how eagerly and easily she had resorted to the dagger and how much it had hurt Swan in turn.

“You unleashed me,” he hisses, turning all that misplaced anger and blame towards her. He lets his rage fill him, lets it power the magic that burns in his blood. The slight hint of fear in her eyes is added spice, and she, none better, knows how emotion powers magic. Emotion is magic and right now his emotions are sky high, setting him alight. Hand curls around an imaginary throat, catching at Regina. He squeezes, a dark stab of enjoyment cutting through him at the choking sound she makes as she fights for oxygen. “You made me anew.”

Arrow suddenly buries itself in his shoulder, Killian giving a grunting sound of surprise at the sensation. It’s enough of a distraction to make him relax his hold on Regina, the woman bending over and gasping in loud gasps of air. He reaches up to awkwardly grab at the shaft of the arrow, roughly ripping it from his flesh without care of injury or pain. Arrow is dropped to the ground with a clatter as he turns back to his original focus, Robin’s gaze wide at how little the attack has affected him.

“Seriously?” Killian complains, eyebrow lifting as he fixes Robin with a stare. “What is _wrong_ with you two? At least have the good form to face me if you are going to attack me.”

“Robin! Get out of here.” Even struggling for breath, she manages to adopt a disdainful air, as if she can’t understand why the other man would be so foolish as to still be here, to try and fight to protect her even though she had done exactly the same thing. The two of them are almost as bad as each other. It makes that unnatural giggle want to rise up and out of him, a faint plan starting to come to mind.

“No,” Killian mused, idea rapidly forming into something solid, something he can use beyond this moment. “No I think not. I think somebody needs a time out instead.” 

He snaps his fingers sharply, the red smoke of his powers greedily curling around Robin’s form, claiming him and whisking the archer off the street. 

“No!” The pained scream is music to his ears, Killian shooting her a sideward glance and small wave before he follows suit, letting his magic take him away.

\--

Curiosity drives him to seek out Emma sooner than planned. 

(He misses her.)

For some reason she hadn’t shared what she knew of his plans. At least, not that he can tell. The heroes seem to be running on guesswork rather than anything else, busy chasing their own tails. Focus now is probably on Robin, on why he would have wanted to take him. Many of his actions are dictated by whim, by the darkness and Killian isn’t sure they know that - or that he might not have an end goal in mind for every little thing he does. Robin is a possibility, nothing more, a card to hold in his hand until he sees what the rest are holding and he might discard him or use him in time.

She is lying with her eyes closed on the sofa in her home. As still as a statue, but even lying down she seems posed for action. He wonders what plans are swirling in her busy little mind, or if she is driven by the same ever changing whims. The cuff is still wrapped securely around her wrist, tampering down her magic. Killian can’t help but smile a little at that, at knowing that neither Henry or Regina trusted her enough to remove it, even in the face of another Dark One roaming free. What must it feel like, to know they trusted Zelena over her? 

“Don’t tell me you’ve just given up Swan.” Words are airily spoken as he properly enters the room, footsteps as light as his words. He is disappointed in her if that is the case. She isn’t supposed to give up - that was what got them into this mess in the first place and she can’t retire from the dance now and leave him alone.

(He will not survive if she leaves him, even as he does his best to leave her.)

It will be no fun if he doesn’t have a worthy adversary. The Crocodile is emasculated without his powers. A pale, pathetic shadow of the monster he had once been - he still deserves death of course, but he has no real means of defending himself now and certainly couldn’t stop Killian. Regina at least has magic still, but she is not her old, Evil self. She is too burdened by caring for people, weakened by Henry, Robin and possibly even the babe her sisters carries. While it might give her added determination to fight on, it will still be her downfall if need be. The rest of Team Hero are barely worthy of the name and no threat at all.

“Hook.”

“Back to Hook now is it? No ‘Killian’ or ‘My Pirate’? Funny how easily you slip back to my more colourful moniker when you are not the one in control.” He gives a dramatic sigh, shaking his head in apparent disappointment, clutching at his chest as if wounded. “However will I cope.”

In one graceful, flowing motion, Emma is up off the sofa, crossing the short distance between them. He cocks his head slightly to the side as he stares down at her, his emotions raging like an uncertain storm. Now that he is facing her, Killian isn't sure what to do. There is pain in her eyes and he thinks she should be proud instead. Shouldn’t everyone be proud when faced with beings of their own creation? He needs to do something, he needs to act as though he came here with some other reason than to simply see her. Blue eyes alight on the cuff, and that reason blossoms in his mind.

“I could take the cuff off you know,” he whispers, fingers dancing against her elbow, drawing tiny circles and patterns against the leather of her coat. Playing the part of the tempter, just as a Dark One should. A faint shiver runs through her body, one he allows himself to think is all down to his touch. Killian can't help but lean a little closer, crowding into her personal space. Head dips a little, so close he could kiss her and he wants to kiss her. He wants to hurt her. Kiss her. Hurt. 

“Your Killian Jones is dead, but I’m here now. I'm lost in the darkness, but I’m here.” Words are whispered lowly, biting back a smile at the pained sob she tries so hard to swallow. He will do both, if she comes with him he will kiss her till she bleeds. He will tear her down and swallow her whole. Sing her praises and spit his hate. She will ruin him even further in turn. They will dance their murderous dance together, something unholy and destructive. He will drown the world in blood for her pleasure and pain. He will never look at another again. 

“Let's be lost in the dark together love,” Killian adds, voice still low, seductive. “Just as you wanted.”

“No. This... this isn't what we should be. What you should be. I'm getting the real you back.” It clearly takes a great deal of effort for Emma to say the words, her eyes darting wildly around the room as she speaks, as her darkness adds its pleas to the mix. All for naught.

Hand drops roughly away from her and the cuff, deliberately leaving it on Emma as he physically puts some distance between them once more, forcing his expression into something cold, unfeeling. He had thought this is what she wanted. To be together. But that was his Swan all over, too proud, too stubborn. Always needing to be the one in control, never letting anyone else set any kind of pace. She doesn't want this thing he has become.

(Killian is proud of her. She truly is the stronger of them.)

“Now who is the one who refuses to accept this is who I am now? Fine. We’ll do it your way. Just remember this down the line. I offered you a chance.”

\--

Depriving them of their memories in Camelot was not as fun as he had hoped. The big surprise was already out of the bag so to speak, they knew he had changed beyond all hope and redemption. Really, Killian doesn't even know why he thought it would have been a good idea to keep them in suspense. It had been Emma’s plan after all. Boring, boring, boring. The things she wants to keep hidden, he wants to shout to the world.

The potion he is creating needs time to ferment which gives him a gap of time to fill. Killian has worked out almost at once that it is dangerous to be alone with his thoughts, that the silence of the world around him gives power to the lies the darkness hisses. His mind turns inward given the chance and Killian doesn't want that. He is so tired. Tired of hurting even now. Surely he is allowed a measure of peace?

_When the deeds are done dearie. Lots to do first,_ it hisses, slithering back into his conscious thoughts right on cue. He can feel the darkness tinting every thought and word, and he needs distraction to keep it from getting worse. Time to play while he waits then, time to give back the memories and watch the chaos it will bring.

Almost everyone important who had been in Camelot are gathered in the mayor's office for some kind of meeting. No doubt to finally discuss the new menace facing the town. Or maybe to plan a town wide party to celebrate not having to put up with him and pretending to like him. Honestly, with this town, it could go either way. Regardless of their motivations, it is the perfect chance for him.

Killian times his entrance carefully. A Dark One always has to have a good sense of timing and dramatics. It comes with the role after all. It is easy enough to spin the chair behind the desk, bit by tiny bit. Turning it so it has its back to the room. After that, it was simply a matter of waiting for the right moment, for voices to raise in angry protest before he silently teleports himself to the chair.

“Perhaps I can be of help?” he offers dryly, spinning himself to face them once more. The hush that fills the room is classic, startled, shocked. All eyes are on him and he relishes it. With deliberate slowness, he leans back, lifting one leg and then the other to rest them on the desk, the perfect image of a slouching insolence. 

“Get out of here, we want nothing from you,” David orders, easily adopting the role of leader. No Emma in sight, they hadn’t bothered to inform her of this meeting, or had and told her not to come. How easily they abandon her once again. Little lost girl. At this rate, he will have to do very little and she will come running back to him of her own accord. Giving them back these tainted memories will surely push them further apart, once they remember all the mistakes both sides made. Regina tries to shield Henry bodily from him he notices with amusement. The lad seems disinclined to take the protection, trying to push his way back to the front, holding his head high. Determined to be a man.

“But I come bearing gifts,” Killian replies with a pout, eyes lowering in mock dismay at their reactions. Gaze slants back upwards after a couple of beats of his heart, blue eyes coyly meeting David’s and the rest. As expected, he sees doubt, hate, anger, all those delicious emotions he can feed off, reflected in their gazes. 

(Killian is confused to see hurt there too, as if his betrayal meant something personal to them. He doesn’t know how to deal with that kind of hurt.)

“It is rude to refuse gifts. And you’ve not even seen them yet.” He clicks his fingers, dreamcatchers appearing in the hands of everyone in the room, memories seeking out their hosts. “I do so enjoy gift giving.” Killian smirks softly as he speaks, still every inch of him relaxed, unconcerned by the hostility radiating off the group clustered around him.

“How can we possibly trust this?” Snow asks, chin tilted just a fraction upward. There are times that he forgets she had once been a Queen in more than just the title. That she had fought and won - and lost - a war. It’s impossible to forget it in this moment, her pose impossibly regal and dignified. Killian finds he wants to explain, he wants her to believe him. From the way she grips the dreamcatcher in her hands, fingers curling around it in a deathgrip however, Queen or no, it will not be a hard sell. Not for herself at least, but she will be strong for the others, will put their needs before her own wants and wishes.

“I don’t gain anything from having you all oblivious to those weeks. In fact, I want you to learn the truth. To know how you helped make us. To know how you failed your daughter m’lady.” It was almost laughable, how resistant they were to the idea that he simply wanted to give them back what was lost. Almost, if you ignored the fact he was evil and not to be trusted.

“Dark Ones do nothing for free,” David said, tone suspicious and hard. He stands with one hand holding his dreamcatcher and the other wrapped around the handle of his gun. Killian knows that given the chance, he would shoot him where he stands. And to think, they had once pretended to be friends. “What do you want for this Hook?”

“This is a gift Dave. One cannot ask for payment for a gift. If you wish to reward me in turn, well... your expressions. That is all I want right now. To see your faces as you remember.”

Giggle is slightly too high pitched, slightly too lyrical to belong wholly to him. He knows it and he suspects at least some of the others know it too. Snow’s expression softens a fraction, Killian catching a whiff of pity in her look. He will not accept pity from any of them, he does not need it or them. He is doing this for himself, nothing more.

“Come on now, who wants these memories,” he hurries on, refusing to give them chance to think any further. 

There is a sharp, pregnant pause before Snow reluctantly nods. 

With a wave of his hand, Killian finds the locks on all the dreamcatchers, releasing them easily. A Dark One created them and so another can end them. Golden light streams from them, to the people holding them and in that moment, all the memories come flooding back.

It is everything he could have hoped. The frozen horror. Muted dismay. Shame and anger and self righteousness all mixing together in one glorious mess. So much pain. Killian will treasure this moment. He only wishes Emma was here to see it too. 

“Oh, I seem to have one left over...” Killian muses once the emotions seem to be under control, staring down at the item his hook is impaling. Regina’s head snaps towards him, colour draining from her face to leave it an ashen grey.

“Robin.”

“Don’t worry Regina,” Killian tells her, tone deceptive soothing. “I’ll make sure he gets them. Should he survive long enough of course.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

Really, bating Regina was even more fun in this state. He has always enjoyed their verbal sparring but it had always been accompanied by the uncomfortable knowledge that she very clearly held the whip hand. As the Evil Queen there were some lines that even he had been hesitant to cross. Not very many true, and he had enjoyed pushing as far as he dared, carefully aimed jabs about her mother by far the most delicious of their games. She could have killed him with a flick of a finger but that had only added to the spice.

(Maybe it was his willingness to press on all those raw spots just for his own sport that had led Regina to decide to betray him over and over. To have planned to curse him into oblivion with the rest. Killian would have accepted losing his memories and everything he was, if only he could kill Rumplestiltskin first. In a way, it would have been a blessing. Probably another reason she had never planned to follow through on their bargain.)

Now he has the power and only a fool wouldn’t enjoy that. Taunting Regina even distracts him somewhat from the ache where his feelings for Emma had once resided. 

“Well it seems only fair. You didn’t want Emma to give into the darkness to save me, but you were perfectly happy risking her sanity when it was your heart on the line so I figure why not make it so if I die... he dies. Unless you manage to save him in time of course. Or I get bored and just kill him.”

“Oh please. We both know you have him locked up in that old farmhouse, the place is covered in magic, trying to block me.” Regina rolls her eyes as she speaks but he is amused to see how tense she is holding herself, a taut wire that betrays her worry for her lover boy. She has regained a little of her colour, no doubt thanks to the hope that is flooding her system, hope that he might give himself away and she will be able to get to Robin.

“Maybe,” Killian agrees lightly, giving a little bounce on his heels as he is suddenly on top of the desk, towering over them all. “Maybe not.”

So she had worked out where he had set up shop. It had to happen sooner or later and course he had hoped it would be later. She still had to actually get into the farmhouse, and his magic will give her a run for her money. If it distracts her from helping the rest in trying to stop him because she is too focused on saving her man, then so much the better. He bites at his bottom lip for a moment, before forcing a laugh as the darkness whispers the perfect thing to say, to twist. To drive her into a fury so she is focused where he wants her.

“What you’re saying is you think you know where he is and you can’t save him? For shame your majesty.”

(Robin is in the farmhouse but Killian isn’t as foolish to admit one way or another. He will move him later, before Regina can do anything.)

Even without his enhanced hearing thanks to magic and simple time, Killian is pretty sure he would have been able to pick up the sound of her grinding her teeth.

“Good Form your Majesty. If you can find him and remove him from my area of control before I get bored, then I will lift the enchantment that binds our lives. Until then, have fun with your memories and the consequences.” He laughs again.

(It is a high pitched giggle.)

With that, he is gone.

\--

David, as always, doesn’t disappoint.

The group had dispersed pretty quickly after his gift. If he was a betting man - which he is - he would probably have placed good money on either Henry or Snow being the first to confront Emma. Oh to be a fly on that wall. He can always borrow the memory later if the mood strikes him of course.

As tempting as it was, to listen in on that, he had other fish to fry. Other goals to accomplish. It is easy enough to make a piece of paper folded into a delicate swan land in front of David the moment he is alone, for a message to come alone to Granny’s inscribed within.

Steam rises from the hot coffee on the table, one for him, one for his guest. It is the only thing that moves in the whole dinner, Killian’s eyes boring into the door as he silently waits. He barely breathes as he sits in the booth, his leather clad figure the only to be seen. Time passes slowly, long enough for him to start to wonder if David will actually show. A shadow looms by the door, a gentle clang breaking the silence as it is pushed open.

Finally.

Killian remains still, his hand still curled around the drink he has not touched, simply watching as David carefully makes his way over to him, settling in the booth seat opposite. Only then does Killian move, using his hook to push the other mug towards his guest, sound impossibly loud against the silence.

The Prince eyes the coffee in front of him with suspicion but makes no move to take it. Clever, even though - this time - it truly is no more than a cup of coffee. One should never accept things from a Dark One. There will always be a price. For a few moments longer they sit in silence,although Killian is sure he must be desperate to know what this was about. Desperate enough to come alone as ordered. He smiles, something slick and practised, lacking any actual emotion.

“Here to give me another stay the hell away from my daughter speeches?” Killian lifts his good hand as he speaks, bending two of the fingers in what he has been reliably informed was something called air quotes and could be used in such a situation. 

Henry had taught him that. 

(The pain of thinking of the lad and how Killian has let him down is as fresh and as biting as the first time.)

“Maybe... where is everyone Hook?” David speaks slowly, as if every word has been picked with great care, both to protect himself and stop him from doing or saying something he might regret.

Killian looks around the deserted dinner, as if only just realising they were alone.

“Oh I killed them,” he told David cheerfully, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world, eyebrow lifting in challenge.

“What?” 

“Relax Dave,” Killian said with a laugh, shaking his head in amusement. “Your face, priceless. Nothing so grim I assure you. I just turned them into cats and mice.” He lifts his hook as he speaks, waving it slightly to summon a large, rather grumpy looking grey cat on the counter that meows pathetically towards them. “See?” 

“I’ve not even shown you the best part.” His enthusiasm is almost childlike as he lifts up a large glass bottle from the seat beside him, an oversized green cricket, complete with waistcoat trapped inside. Grin is bright, the apparent innocence a stark contrast to the rest of him as he taps at the glass with his hook, intently watching the insect within.

“I couldn’t help myself,” Killian admits, tone hushed as though sharing a secret. 

“Hook, what do you want?” David looks increasingly frustrated, some small part of Killian deflating at the rection. Then again, what had he expected? For David to suddenly forget every moral fiber he possessed and be impressed? For the Prince to so far forget himself that he didn’t mind Killian had turned goodness knows how many people into various animals? To admire the game? Impossible. He sighs loudly, making a great show of placing the bottle back down by his side. To business then.

“It’s funny, you and I both know if Snow had been the one cut by Excalibur, you would have found a way, you would have begged Emma to save her, for your True Love, the price would have been worth it. And then she would have been filled with darkness. Oh, but we’ve seen that already haven't we? A world with a dark Snow White. Be honest Dave, part of you wishes you really had killed me then.” He pauses for a moment to take in the effect his words are having, enjoying the tensing of jaw and the way his hands clenched as he tried to internally deny the words. Everyone had some wickedness in them, something a little dark, and if playing the other man like a musical instrument was what it took to make him face that, then so be it. “Probably not a small part either.”

Killian remembers only too clearly what David had been like without his heart, the dark Prince Charming who had murdered him in cold blood. The drama of losing Emma almost instantly after that had pushed it from the forefront of his mind, but there were nights before this endless nightmare when he had woken in a cold sweat, the memory of a sword in his back achingly clear.

“I almost miss that world. With some obvious alterations to myself of course. Perhaps I should recreate it, let you and your wife rule again, it should go without saying that I’ll keep Emma in the tower, chained for my... pleasure.” As expected, his words bring out a fury, the protective dad urges kicking in and overriding any fears he might have for himself, for the fact that he is facing a Dark One. David surges up and out of the booth, knocking over his coffee as he lunges for for him. Killian lifts his hand in apparent surrender, leaning back from the other man.

“It’s no worse than she did to me mate. Just because you couldn’t see my cuffs, didn’t make them any less real. You must remember what it was like when Snow had your heart and you kissed her. I blame you for this Dave. Not as much as her of course, but you failed Emma when she needed you the most.”

Head snaps to the side suddenly, David and the conversation they were having completely forgotten as something surges through him. A rush of power that makes him suck in a sharp breath as he struggles to breathe against it. Something new - something old - has entered the town, a rich wave of magic colouring the air. Someone took the cuff off Emma.

“Looks like someone let Swan out. Two unrestrained Dark Ones in one town Dave... what are you going to do?”

He slips out of the booth, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet as he waits for Emma. She will surely come looking for him now she is free.

Like her father, Emma doesn't disappoint. 

(In this respect at least.)

\--

She chases him across the length of the town. It is a dance to Killian, slipping in and out of the physical plane, waiting just long enough for her to appear, to see him, before he is gone once more. If he wanted to, he could lose Emma. She must know it as well and the fact he is letting her keep up probably makes her think there is a chance for - for whatever it is she wants now all the lies and truths have been unmasked. Finally, she corners him at the docks - or he grows bored with the chase and honestly Killian can no longer tell the difference. He offers her a dramatic bow, wind whipping his hair, making it look more wild than usual, reflecting his increasingly wild and uncontrolled thoughts. 

“Come to take me up on my offer Swan? Or do you intend to stand in my way and try and stop me achieving the thing I’ve lived for all these decades? The thought of killing him kept me going in Neverland, kept me going through everything.” 

“And then what,” Emma challenges, eyes pleading as she stares at him. Always with the silent pleading, that self righteous ‘think about what you are doing, it is wrong because I say so’ face. “You think if you kill Gold you’ll be free? Ho- Killian, the darkness doesn’t care about your revenge or what you want.”

“Free?” His laugh is harsh as he utters the single word, sharp without any amusement in it. The type of laugh that could cut wrists and shatter glass in its sharpness. Enjoyment of the moment pools out of him, as rapidly as his life had faded away in that field. She never did know when to quit. Her actual meaning behind her words are unimportant, lost in the thought of that single word he had seized upon, and the wound that it reopened. The wound she has no idea about. 

_Tut, tut. Never telling her about what daddy dearest did to you, you just let her commit the worst possible crime she could against you didn’t you._

A brief flinch of pain crosses his features as he pushes the darkness away as best he can. Forces those taunts and thoughts away, he cannot afford them right now. He is not that scared little boy any more, betrayed for the first - heaven knows not the last - time. He is not weak and feeble. He will never be weak again. Among other things.

“I’ll never be _free_ Swan, you saw to that.” The word ‘free’ is all but spat at her, the bitterness growing in him with every passing second. It makes the darkness in him laugh gleefully, growing in equal strength to his negative emotions. He is being played but knowing that does not change how he feels. Cannot change how he feels. 

“You sold my soul to the darkness love. What else did you think the price was to save my life? I get to exchange one Master for another.” He looks away, jaw clenching tight, unable to meet her gaze. “I suppose I should be used to it.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Emma asks, a blank look on her face. He might never have outright told her but he has dropped so many clues, so many hints. And always, she had thrown his attempts back in his face, had laughed at the way he had tried to show they were the same, that he understood her pain because he had something similar. She had never wanted to know, never wanted to comfort him and so he had never wanted to share further.

“Not yet love,” Killian tuts, shaking his head brisky. “You didn’t care before so why now. The stage is set Swan, the actors are ready. All we can do is enjoy the show. Don’t follow me again.” He needs to put some distance between them, as though that could possibly put distance between himself and the little boy he can see in his mind’s eye. The memories scream out with pain, a pain he cannot share with the woman he loves - hates - loves. 

\--

He doesn’t go far. He doesn’t need to, he needs to test her, needs to know if she will allow him this false freedom or if she will put her own needs before his own yet again. It is easy enough to teleport himself to one of the buildings lining the docks, the upper storey empty. Even easier to inch his way over to the grimy window and peer down at the blond still standing below. If Emma focuses, she could follow his trail before it gets too cold, just as she had when they had danced through the town. 

She simply stands there, shoulders slumped, dejected and apparently defeated. As if his words, his rejection had actually meant something. It makes part of him ache a little, to see her like this, wounded, vulnerable. 

_Tricks and lies. She probably suspects you are nearby still._

He doesn't want to believe its words. Killian knows how much it lies but he can't help the worry that perhaps she is playing him. Perhaps he shouldn't care. He is built for pain and destruction, this is a moment he should enjoy. It's hard to enjoy this though. Hard to want to cause her more suffering, when he could ease it instead. 

Movement below catches his eye, Killian refocusing his attention on the scene as Henry appears, the pair talking briefly. Even from this distance, he can see the way her body language brightens the longer she is with her son, how the two seem to have some tentative relationship once more. Emma even goes so far as to give Henry a kiss on his forehead before she teleports herself away. Leaving the lad alone and a tempting target at that. Curious. Killian wants to know more, needs to know more, easily appearing where Swan had stood seconds before.

Henry jumps a little at his sudden appearance but doesn't make any attempt to run away or cry out for help. Another curious fact, he knows part of Emma will be focused on her son, that she would have heard a shout, just as she had known when he was in danger. So many questions, all wrapped up in the teenage boy in front of him.

“Hello lad, it was you wasn't it. The one who let your mother out?” Killian asks. Henry, to his credit doesn't even try and deny it, and simply nods.

“Why?” He honestly doesn't understand. They had worked so hard to contain her in the past, to control her, Regina especially. To have so casually given her the power to kill them all once more, it makes no sense.

“She started trusting me again, we were working together to try and get the memories back when she could have attempted to do it alone like before,” Henry explains, an earnest look on his face. “I had to show we trusted her in turn. You understand. Or, at at least, you used to. It was the right thing to do.” Henry is so confident in this moment, in his words and his reasoning. As if trust is something a Dark One can give or earn.

He believes it, believes in Emma. He even seems to believe in Killian a little, but then that was what Henry did after all. Still, the boys words can't help but shame him somewhat, remembering how hard the pair of them had fought for Emma, how they had tried to show her she was more than the darkness and yet he cannot allow the same train of thoughts for himself. Killian feels the urge to share something in return, to justify some of his more recent actions.

“It talks to me you know,” Killian admits after a moment, at a loss at what to say but he needs someone to understand. To realise what it was like to have so much pain and darkness whispering and screaming in your ear. For it to twist everything you were, everything you knew into something unrecognizable. 

“I know,” Henry replies, body shifting awkwardly, hands shoved deep in his pockets. 

Of course. The boy has lived his whole life surrounded by some of the darkness people in any realm. An Evil Queen for a mother, a Dark One for a grandfather, even before the curse was broken when they had just been his mother and a town full of people, it had been a dark place. And now his other mother has become a Dark One. He knows darkness and evil, possibly as well as Killian does, albeit in a different way. His knowledge might be deep but Henry is still lucky in that it is one pace removed. He sees darkness, he doesn’t have to live it. 

“For all its faults, I have to say this, the darkness is a good teacher. Look at what I’ve done already.” Killian’s words take on a slightly desperate edge as he speaks, and for the first time since his heart was shoved back into his chest, he starts to doubt the path this new power has led him along. He is no longer proud of everything he has achieved. God, what had he done? Kidnapping Robin, seperating people who loved each other. Turning Archie back into a cricket. All the others he had transformed for fun. Taunting the Charming family, all the anger he had thrown at Emma, and all for what? A chance at a revenge he thought he had given up because he didn’t want it anymore? He... did he want it? 

Henry’s smile is sad, sadder and older than it has any right to be. A teenage boy should not wear such an aged expression, one he has seen mirrored on his brother’s face, on his own, so many lifetimes and servitudes ago. 

“That doesn't meet you should listen Hook. Mom can fight it, I know you can too.”

“No, I can’t. Why are you talking to me? I’m the bloody Dark One now I’m not strong like Swan, and you’re not my son, what is to stop me from killing you for sport?” Killian shakes his head as he talks, frustration bubbling away and he wishes it was half as easy as Henry made it out to be.

“You won’t hurt me,” Henry tells him confidently. Too confidently, as though he knows something Killian doesn’t. 

Now that he thinks about it, the darkness has been suspiciously quiet since Henry appeared, no comments, not even a lingering touch in the back of his mind. It has vanished as cleanly as it can from his thoughts and for these few moments he has thought more clearly than he has in a long time.

Something about Henry drives it to silence. Fear? Or something worse? It seems to have no interest in harming the lad if the lack of murderous suggestions is anything to go by. That should reassure him, to know that one person he might care for will be spared the oncoming storm. It terrifies him. Because the darkness has no reason to spare someone, especially someone that is so vulnerable, someone that is connected so intimately to all the people that he wants to hurt. Henry’s death would ruin this town in one broken, fatal strike. 

Whatever it is, this isn’t fear of Henry. No, it wants something.

That idea is enough to send him into the start of a panic, almost throwing himself backwards and away from Henry. He needs to get away, get away and his heart is pounding in his ears, the drum beat overriding anything the lad might be saying. He can see lips moving but nothing more, and all Killian can focus on is the need to escape, using his magic to put as much distance as he can between them, finding himself by the wishing well of all places. He is alone again. It is easier to breathe now, his heartbeat slowly quietening down, new questions filling his mind. 

“What do you have planned for him? Tell me!” Killian tries to keep his tone cold and harsh as he shouts out into the silence, for the first time attempting to willingly summon the foreign presence in his consciousness. 

Finally, he feels it stirring in his mind, stretching out and he realises the silence was no retreat. Instead, it was calculation, it was consideration as it weighed Henry up. The darkness doesn’t take any tangible form, doesn’t appear to him in the guise of the crocodile and yet for all of that, he can feel it smiling. Row upon row of razor sharp teeth flashing in his direction. 

_It seems as though the boy has... potential._

\--

The darkness eases his doubts. Soothes and smooths down the edges its short absence has caused. Reassures him of how this is the only way. Even if Killian wanted to change his mind, it is too late now. He has come too far, done too much. They will never forgive him, he knows this. They will never believe he has had a change of heart. They will kill him, they will side with the crocodile and so he has no choice now. It is better this way, better he just accept it and play the role that he has always been destined to play. What is Captain Hook after all, if not a villain?

He _feels_ her shout his name, jarring him out of his thoughts without warning. It was something that went beyond sound or any other basic sense but seemed to be deeper. Is this what it had felt for her when he had called her name? That undeniable tug, the pull as her voice tries to call to him, reaching across the distance between them, the near overpowering urge to listen. Who needs a physical tether when he has this?

Killian answers her call. 

She is furious. Eyes burn with unshed tears, making the fury in them burn even brighter. Every inch of Emma is a hard, sharp line, rage spilling out on her in waves of power. He doesn’t believe she has ever been more beautiful, than she is in this moment, utterly ruined and wrecked. All thanks to him. He is both pleased and dismayed by that.

“You went after Henry!” 

He had _talked_ to Henry. The intent was not the same. Killian wants to defend himself, wants to explain this to Emma. He wants a lot of things that he doesn’t get, the same familiar song in a new setting. But he finds himself smiling instead, biting lightly at his bottom lip, letting his teeth catch for a moment before the lip rolls back into the small smile.

“I did. What’s the matter Swan? Afraid I might try and take the lad for another little trip? Robin is getting a little lonely, I’m sure he could use some company.” It doesn’t even sound like his own voice anymore, a low hiss of a snake as he threatens those she cares about. How easily he plays his part now. True fear grips him, control lost to the darkness. It is afraid too, he can feel its fear wrapping around his neck and threatening to squeeze. Emma must not know just how interesting it finds Henry. She must not know he still cares.

“Why are you doing this?”

“Because... I want to hurt you. Like you hurt me.”

(He doesn’t want this. He doesn’t. Pleasepleaseplease he doesn’t want to do this.)

Emma takes an involuntary half step backwards, as though the words had physically struck her. She had hurt him so badly, the wound made even worse by how easily he had played into it all, how much he had loved her and how he had followed the drum of her making. It is only fair she feel a fraction of that pain in return. Killian feels as though his point is well and truly made, her anger broken down by his own, pain splashed deliciously across her face. Killian turns sharply on his heel to leave, thoughts returning to his many plans as he moves. The potion is almost ready, Regina is highly strung by her worry for Robin - speaking of Robin, he still needs to take the next few steps ther- 

“Your rings.”

Her quiet words have him pausing mid step and thought, caught by them as surely as when she had used Excalibur on him. Killian didn’t turn around, simply standing there with his back to her. Hand lifts a little to examine the rings dotted along fingers. Where all his clothing was from his old life, the rings that adorned his hand were the complete opposite, plastic plain black bands of this world replacing the thick silver and gemmed adorned rings of before. Killian hadn't expected her to actually notice they were different now.

(Please.)

“You... you told me once that your rings were a symbol. That any crime can be forgiven.” Her voice wavers a little as she speaks, a slight hitch and break in the words. 

“Aye,” Killian agrees, voice just as soft. His head tilts a little to the side to show he is listening although he still doesn’t turn to face her. He doesn't know where she is going with this, and that sets the darkness on edge too, unsure of her. It has always been unsure of her.

“You aren’t wearing your crimes anymore. Do yo-.”

“I don’t need too Swan.” Killian interrupts her briskey, refusing to let them go down that road. He is not going to talk about his old rings, about the past, about crimes that shame him even now. It was a moment of weakness that he feels like a sword by his throat. Easily, the darkness in him rises the challenge she has unwittingly set, selecting his words for him. It is better to spit lies when he can’t see her face. When he can’t be weakened by the pain. The darkness doesn’t like weakness, not like this. It wants pain and misery on its terms and its terms only. “I don’t need forgiveness. Not for such petty, unimportant crimes. Just you wait, Swan, I’ll have new ones soon. But they won’t be reminders, it’ll be like the good old days. Remember what I told you they used to be? What they should be?”

“Trophies.” The word is whispered, and there is such despair in that single word. Such defeat. “Killian. Please. You can’t mean that... you want trophies again?”

“Yes.”

(No.)

“I also want my brother’s ring back.” Killian announces suddenly, turning at long last to face her. Change the subject, shift the tone, keep her on her toes. Don’t give her time to react, don’t give anyone time to react, to think, to reason. Disorientation is the best defense he has right now, too many thoughts of his own - and not his own - churning in his mind like choppy waters. He holds his hand out impatiently, snapping his fingers towards her as he does. 

“What?”

“The ring Swan. Hand it over.” 

(Save me.)

Killian is surprised when she actually lifts her hand, ring and silver chain appearing nestled in her palm. It sits there, glinting in the light and Killian knows in his heart that Liam’s ring belongs with her. He has already demanded it back though, words hanging heavily in the air between them, Killian powerless to take them back, to unsay them. He feels frozen as she slowly reaches out, tilting her palm and letting the silver flow from her skin to pool around his own. 

For the first time since this all began, she is the one to walk away first. She strides away fast, using the mortal way to abandon him and Killian tells himself it is just disappointment at her refusing to use her magic to make a dramatic exit that causes something to ache in his chest. 

\--

Every instinct in him is screaming to head down to the docks. To find the sea and let his gaze stray out to the horizon, let himself be soothed by the waves. The water has been the balm to his burning soul for centuries and Killian feels the need for that now. He is on fire, every sinew straining to try and escape the agony that wants to utterly consume him. The water calls to him, offers him familiar and reassuring comfort, the false promise of escape from this fire.

He heads to the woods on the other side of the town instead. Deeper and deeper into the forest, passing under branch and falling leaves. Nobody will think to look for him here, if anyone even cares to look for him at all. The trees do not sooth him as he passes them briskly. Then again, he does not wish to be soothed. He does not deserve to be soothed.

Killian Jones is all but gone now. 

Burnt away by the fires, purged and reborn as a dark phoenix. What is left is what was born within him, some festering dark thing that wears his face and shares his memories. It is not the man he had hoped he could have become, not a man Milah or Liam would have recognized. It is barely a man at all. His thoughts are not his own. Everything he was has been tainted, violated by the darkness that covers him.Even when it does not actively speak, it twists and his thoughts are muddled. Manipulating him, controlling him as its puppet. Just as it had promised. 

The metal of the recently reclaimed ring is cool against his fevered fingers, Killian rolling it round and around in his hand as he works his way ever deeper through the trees. 

He had asked for it back. Why did he ask for it back?

(Why did she give it back?)

Why did he ruin every good thing that happened to him? What did the darkness want now? Long ago now it seems, he had hoped he could - not control the darkness exactly. Killian had known the moment Emma had admitted the truth, that it would come to something like this. He was not built to resist this corruption. But he had hoped that he could do something to slow it down somehow. That he could put some kind of plan into effect to beat it, keep it distracted with thoughts of petty mayhem and maybe gain enough time for, for... for whatever feverish dream he had been banking on. It had been a subconscious wish, true, but one he has failed nevertheless. He is all out of time now.

All Killian can do now is hope that someone will be able to kill this new him. He has never wanted to lose more badly before. And more importantly, Killian finds himself hoping that Emma will survive this - he prays she won’t have to be the one to end him, he doesn’t want her to have to carry that added pain. No matter how much she hates him now, he doesn’t want her to hurt more than she has to by his passing.

\--

“You wouldn't be thinking of going back on our deal, now would you dearie?” The demon’s voice is even more harsh than normal, nails raking down his back, leaving mental gashes in their wake. 

Killian doesn't pause in his movements, hand merely lifting in a dismissive gesture towards where the creature lurked. He is pacing for the sake of pacing, needing the movement. It is easier to think when he is moving, easier to cling to the tiny fragments that are still him, flotsam on an inky tide. 

“You’re the one in my head, you tell me,” he chuckles humorlessly, making yet another circuit of the small clearing he has found. It's eyes narrow in frustration, and Killian can’t help but be a little proud of that, of knowing he has finally gotten to it, affected it at long last. 

“All this dancing around, taunting your old allies when you should be setting things to right with your crocodile. When you should be getting his blood as we agreed.” 

Aside from his encounter with Belle, Killian has done his best to avoid anything that was connected to the crocodile, had deliberately stayed away from the pawn shop as best he could. He isn’t ready to face that demon yet, despite all his boosts to the contrary. 

(He still doesn’t know if he actually wants to. That is a door he cannot open again if he decides to close the crocodile’s life.)

“Tell me something,” the demon croons after a couple of seconds of silence, a sick smile on his features. It has had an idea clearly, a new way to hurt him and Killian unconsciously grits his teeth as he waits for it's taunt, trying to brace himself against whatever blow it is going to strike now. “What did Milah’s laugh sound like? How did she smell? What colour were her eyes?”

Blue. Blue like the sea. No, no, they were brown, she was the earth. Blue. Brown. 

He will not play its games, but the questions had come so rapidly, his mind had automatically scrabbled to try and answer them, at least internally. He does not want to to play these games but he needs to know. He plays its game. 

Milah’s hair was as dark as the night. Her smile lit up entire buildings and had warmed his heart better than any fire could ever do. Her voice was the gentle melody that could soothe any sea monster, even one such as he.

But her eyes. They flashed warning and invitation all at once. They had captivated him without, he suspects, really intending to. Killian has always loved her eyes. Those soulful eyes and the colour of them was. It was. He knows this. He has to still know this. Something so simple and yet so important. The darkness is messing with his mind, his memories. It has to be. He can't have forgotten. Not when his whole existence is so intimately bound up with her, with his loss. 

Her eyes. What colour were her eyes?

(They were green.)

“You can remember properly you know. You are the Dark One now. You can step inside your memories and view everyone as crisp as the moment it happened. You can see her and decide once and for all which woman you are going to follow... and which you are going to ignore.”

He finds himself finally stopping his pacing, lifting his hand and hook, staring down at his arms as though they are somebody elses limbs and Killian feels distant in this moment, watching this unfold through foggy eyes. Choosing Emma, wanting Emma, didn’t mean rejecting Milah, it had never meant rejecting Milah... had it?

Fingers twitch and the next second the book he liberated from Emma’s basement is resting against one of the trees. The demon circles him as he slowly makes his way over to it, replacing his frenzied movements with more calculating ones of its own.

“A spell. Similar to the dreamcatchers we used before but we aren’t taking memories dearie. Just enhancing them. Just seeing them as they truly were, not faded pages where you only remember parts. You can see those eyes again.” It’s voice is like honey now, offering its advice, its guidance and Killian forgets how the question had originally been to hurt him. Forgets that he should never listen to the demon. Forgets that he cannot trust this other voice, everything else crowded out by guilt over forgetting her eyes.

Pages start turning in the book, magically flicking thanks to his subconscious desire. Milah. He misses her, he loves her, and **he can’t remember what colour her eyes were**. Killian needs to remember. The book finds the page after a few seconds, Killian’s eyes skimming over the instructions quickly. There is enough ingredients left over from the potion he has already created to brew this new one. It is surprisingly - suspiciously - simple to brew, with so few items needed and so few steps to be taken.

“It’s barely worth your time dearie. A Dark One should be casting something much more powerful than this parlor trick, but if you want to remember you will have to stoop to a low level, in some extremely basic magic.” The figment examines its nails as it speaks, expression one of the utmost boredom and he should wonder why it even cares enough to tell him how to do this, if it doesn’t further its own interests.

Still in a daze, Killian lets himself go through the motions of creating the potion, summoning items from the house as he goes, feeling the need to do this now. Now, now, now. It feels as though mere seconds have passed and then he is clutching a a small red bottle tightly in his hand, preparations complete. The crocodile is still staring at its hand, not even looking up as it speaks to him. 

“Ready to remember your lost love?” 

“Aye.” Killian doesn’t allow himself any time to think, he just lifts the tiny bottle and downs the thick liquid inside. The world turns black.

\--

Senses come back to him slowly.

He can smell the sea salt air. Hear the sounds of men working on a ship. See the sight of his beloved Jolly Roger as he stumbles up the gangplank. Feel that there is someone supporting his left side, heat radiating from them as they stumble along. His whole body aches. Thoughts are sluggish, and for the moment Killian is content to simple move as he is guided. Behind him, he hears light footsteps.

Milah’s voice from beside him is worried as she orders for water to be fetched.

Wait.

Milah?

Body moves independently of his wishes, Killian feeling himself separate from her and head along the deck. Another familiar voice sounds, snide, dangerous and he feels dread sink into every part of him. If he was in control, Killian knows he would have thrown up at the knowledge that the Dark One is standing next to Milah in his full and terrible glory. 

No. No, this is not what he wanted. Not this moment, this place, why this place? Out of all the memories he shared with Milah, all the possible memories he could relive again, why the last moment they had shared? Why would he send himself here?

(Dark Ones always did have a particularly cruel sense of humour.)

Killian cannot turn away as the scene starts to play out in front of him, cannot pull Milah away from the monster that is shortly to claim her life. He is a prisoner in his own body, a spectator at his own life. As though his current mind is sharing his past body with his past mind. He is there, he can feel, but that is all. His hand lifts to brandish the bean at Rumplestiltskin no matter how hard he tries to keep it down. While normally Killian would delight in taunting someone more powerful than himself, he knows only too well the price that this moment will extract from him.

This is not like reliving even a particularly vivid memory. This is the actual moment, every lungful of breath real. He is seeing and feeling it happen as though for the first time. He cannot speak the words in his mind, can do nothing but watch the scene in front of him unfold once more. Powerless behind his eyes, Killian hears his own cries, hears the words that are leading up to that moment. That terrible, terrible moment. It matches ever closer, events playing out relentlessly towards its grim conclusion.

The scream in his mind is echoed by the noise of pure anguish that comes from his mouth as golden fingers curl impossibly tight against Milah’s bright red heart, replacing the colour with dull grey. 

Killian watches as the woman he loves dies in his arms once more. He feels himself die with her.

\--

There are leaves stuck to his face, the edge of one pressing into his mouth, Hook gagging a little at the sensation. He is face down in the dirt of some forest, and yet seconds ago he had been thrashing on his bed as the fever had set in, his body revolting against the wound, fighting off the threat of infection and worse. Why bother fighting the fire of disease when Milah is gone? Milah. Milah, his beloved Milah, cut down in front of him. The sight of her heart turning into dust and pouring out between clenched fingers is one he knows will haunt him for the rest of his days. The demon has to pay for what he did. That is why he needs to fight this. He lives to avenge her. 

Roughly he tries to push himself upright, limbs shaking at the effort. Where is the Jolly Roger? Where, for that matter, is he?

Gradually the memories of his long life filter back in. It has been centuries since that moment, not seconds, and Hook is grateful that the images that are returning to him trickle like a steam instead of a roar like the sea, something majestic and truly powerful. He had done so much, all for his revenge and then some pretty blonde wench had smirked at him and Hook had thrown it all away? Pathetic. How could he have allowed his heart to start beating for another? How could he have been so weak? He had allowed the pain of that moment to fade, had let his feelings for Milah fade a little as well, he had let the memory of dust turn to ash in his mind. The very thing he had sworn never to do.

He has betrayed Milah, as surely as though he was the one to stop her heart. Hook had started to forget the love they had shared, had started to treat it as something in the past instead of the now. How could he have allowed the demon to carry on living? How could he have stayed in this godforsaken town, day after day, week after week, with the bloody crocodile living just down the street from him?

His stump is burning. The brace is wearing at his skin, rubbing it raw with every tremble of his arm. It is at once both familiar and new, nerve ends sending conflicting messages as his mind tries to properly catch up with himself. 

Gaze is blurry, dipping in and out of focuses as he looks up - right into the face of the demon. With a snarl, Hook tries to strike it, lashing out like some wounded beast without thought or plan, just the need for simple pain. Rumplestiltskin merely laughs, making no attempt to doge the mindless flail, his hook flying through it as though the crocodile isn’t there.

It wouldn’t be the first time Hook had seen a cowardly smirk and wavy hair at the bottom of too many bottles of rum but he hasn’t been drinking, the final few days worth of memories returning to him. That’s right. A vision. The thing in front of him wasn’t real but rather some aspect of himself, conjured up out of the darkness of his mind.

“Well?” 

Chest is heaving as he looks back down at the forest floor he was still lying on, Hook slowly adjusting himself into a semi slumped sitting position as he weighs up his new options. Wrist still burns, setting him alight and Hook can feel his hand still. Every joint in nonexistent fingers ache, little shoots of pain snaking down his arm with every simple breath he takes.

“Well?” It asks again, a hint of doubt appearing on its features - but that is impossible surely, it is in his mind, it knows all he knows. “What do you want to do now Hook?”

“You have to ask?” His smile is easy, pleasure uncoiling in his stomach as he realises how close he was to his goal, at long last, no matter how dark his thoughts grew. Soon, his love could rest - and then he didn't give a damn what happened. This power is a gift and one he does not intend to waste. Distinctly, he hears that damnable giggle but for the first time, he pays it no mind, thoughts too full of the upcoming battle, and the scores that could finally be settled. 

It was time to skin a crocodile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I went a little crazy trying to figure out Milah's eye colour. I must have watched her scenes dozens of times, and sometimes they seemed blue, sometimes green. In the end I just went with green, so regardless of actual colour, for this story they are green. I probably got it wrong but oh well. 
> 
> Hope you all enjoyed this! Comments and Kudos as always feed my soul and this story! Thanks for reading.


	5. Chapter Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of all, I am sorry for the delay here. I’m not really happy with this chapter, a lot of it I rewrote over and over again. Got hit by some bad writers block, and even though I knew what I wanted to write, it just didn’t want to come out of my head and onto the page. In the end Dark Hook pretty much just took the wheel and we went in a different direction to how I had originally planned. 
> 
> Which leaves me with a choice, this isn’t where I had planned to leave this chapter. So I can either try and wrap this story up in eight instead of seven chapters - it's not a long poem I’m using, I’m limited on lines - and end it where I had planned. OR. I can stick to the planned seven chapters, finish it sooner than I had planned and write a sequel which will have shorter chapters and a more consistent upload schedule. Let me know what you guys would like, obviously a lot more angst with a sequel, but longer till the happy ending.
> 
> Anyway, onwards to this chapter, I hope you do enjoy it.
> 
>  **Chapter Warning:** Blood, gore, violence and some unpleasant hand related injuries.

## 

** Chapter Five **

####  _**I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. - Pablo Neruda**_

__  
The crocodiles shop is his destination.

Everything else around him, sound, sight, smell, fades away like some fever dream.

(Or maybe this moment is the fever dream, a small voice whispers, something softer than the cutting words he has come to accept from the darkness. Maybe this is the fever. Maybe this is wrong.)

He can't see the people he passes beyond the fact that there are things in his way, objects to push aside. One tries to speak to him as he nears his destination - he had hoped the walk would calm his thoughts enough to focus, more fool him. The blur even goes as far as to grab at his arm, a jumble of noise spilling out around them, sounds over lapping each other. Hook cannot fiocus on the noise, on the shape, he just wants it gone, and he lashes out, pushing with the power that surges within him. Away, away, he needs whoever - whatever - it is gone. The shape flies through the air, out of his sight and then it is finally quiet, with only his thoughts for company.

All he can truly hear is that blasted name.

_Crocodile... Crocodile... Crocodile..._

It repeats in his mind, a constant loop that seems to be synced to his heartbeat. Or, perhaps it is the sound itself that is his heart, the words drowning out any thumping sound the organ might be making. The beast may as well have ripped out his heart along with Milah’s for all the good it has done for him since then. The few times he has allowed it to beat with something other than his desire for revenge it had caused him nothing but agony. Hook cannot think about that right now. He cannot let his thoughts drift to the other who his heart cries out for, because there is no other. There is only Milah. 

In this moment there can be only Milah.

He will deal with all the other feelings later.

The shop is mere meters away. His revenge is mere seconds away. His life's purpose is about to be realised. 

_Crocodile... Crocodile... Crocodilecrocodilecrocodilecroc-_

With a crazed grin on his already too pale features, Hook kicks open the door. It swings wildly, smacking against the wall before bouncing back a little. The din it makes is delicious, bell jangling madly at the force. Hook saunters in like he owns the place, every step oozing confidence and determination. An entrance worthy of a Dark One, one guaranteed to draw the eye of anyone in the room.

The shop is empty.

“Well, that was a waste of an entrance.” Hook feels the need to speak the words aloud for reasons he can't quite understand. Maybe to pretend that he had meant to flamboyantly crash into an empty room.

(Maybe because he has to speak aloud to try and banish the voices that are screaming his enemies name over and over until he cannot think straight.)

A calculating look comes across his face as he examines the shop, the door finally closing shut behind him. 

It is empty true, but then Hook doesn’t need the man to come willingly. Or even knowingly.

He closes his eyes, letting the darkness fill him. There is nothing else but the black. It knows how to use the gifts burning in his blood and so Hook allows it control, lets it whisper its way through him. So what if another piece of his soul is sacrificed in the process? It's a useless thing anyway.

He - it - reaches out, stretching over the town. Arms spread out wide as he searches, finding threads of life and chasing them back to their owners, tasting them before discarding them. He can feel the prickly power that is Regina's life, the sickening sweetness of honey masking steel that is Snow. There is the no nonsense attitude that can only belong to Granny. All these lives held in his hands.

Each one is combed through and brushed aside. Another time he would enjoy this, take more time and pick them apart. Devour them and the darkness promises they can do that. This is heavy magic, hard to keep up and if he isn't careful he could wear himself out before he finds his target. The only reason this can even work is the way the town is so tightly bound together. Magic runs through every inhabitant, even those unable to tap into it themselves. It is a back door to their lives and Hook does not know how it appeared, does not care. A left over from the original curse perhaps. 

( _She_ is burning so bright, so bright, it is a flash of white and hot and bright and it makes the darkness howl. It burns his tongue, the scolding shock of being plunged into boiling water. Hide, hide, hide, pull away. _She_ dulls a second later, shadows mixing with the light, blending into something more subtle. He pulls away even further, retreating before his presence can be felt.)

There. He can feel the spark that is the crocodile, the tainted threads of a life worn thin. It makes his stomach churn but he forces himself to press closer, to trace the path right back to him. Magical fingers pinch at the core of it, letting it flow around him as he focuses his magic more and more on that spot. Even this sort of touch makes him feel sick. He doesn’t want to touch the man but he needs to drag him here.

Hook takes a deep breath, opens his eyes to stare at the counter across the room and pulls.

Red smoke curls up rapidly forming into a humanoid shape and size. It twists around and around itself, and then just as suddenly - it is gone. A startled man stands in its place. The crocodile. At long last. For what feels like the longest time, neither speaks. Now that Hook finally has the man in front of him, he finds he is somewhat at a loss of what to say. There is so much he wants to say. So much they have both already said to the other. How do you express such mortal, all consuming hate in just a greeting? And a farewell at the same time, he knows that this will end with only one of them standing. Throat feels dry, itchy, his whole body is itchy, a heat and restless energy that rushes over him as the darkness surges greedily within. The delight that he feels in this moment is not wholly his own.

Somewhere, in the shop, a clock starts to loudly tick.

“So Belle was right. Emma made you into a dark one.” Gold’s words hold venom, disdain and a little bit of fear, that much was to be expected. They also hold... disbelief? 

Hook frowns, the mask of manic energy slipping a little. He had doubted the librarians words? No, the belief is not aimed at Belle, not really. It isn’t even aimed at Emma, but rather, it seems to be directed... inward? 

_He doesn't realise how worthy you are of us Hook. How we chose you. He thinks we made a mistake but we didn't, did we. Prove it to us dearie. Prove you are special._

It whispers and hisses, slithering around in his mind, and Hook lets himself draw strength from that. To be chosen, to be considered worthy of anything, it was more potent than any rum he had downed in his life. He was so weak, so pathetic. To chase after words of praise, encouragement, to want to be worthy of even this shadow. He is disgusting. Hook feels this self hate, this self loathing. He lets it fuel him. Nobody else offered him support and so he will take this, even if it is poisonous.

(Others had chosen him. _She_ had chosen him. He chooses to forget that in this, his moment of triumph and failure.)

He takes this moment to truly look at his enemy. To force himself to look beyond the curl of lips and the subdued lilt to his words. He looks beyond the surface fear that this is death, looks beyond the hate and rage, all the festering wounds that tell the tales of their fights. It pleases Hook, to know he has managed to leave marks on the Crocodile, to know that he is not the only one wearing scars. 

There is hunger in his eyes. Hunger for the darkness that crackles and hisses across Hook’s mind and skin. Even now, the man yearns for this power once more. After spending so long drowning it, and he wants it back like some suffocating blanket. How can he possibly stand it? Hook is using it because it will grant him his goal, using it because it is impossible not to, the voices and the power intoxicating and terrifying all at once. It is using him back, buffeting him along like countless crashing waves, piling on one after another until he cannot breathe against their force. 

But he doesn’t want this. He would never have chosen this, to have extinguished the final glowing embers of his sanity and soul to the night.

(Not even to kill his mortal enemy.)

“And now you’ve come for your revenge.” Gold is still speaking, his words rushing back into Hook’s ears, like the rush of blood. 

“Oh I don’t want to fight!” This has turned interesting, taunting his crocodile. Eyes are blown wide with faux innocence, Hook even going so far as to blink a couple of times as he forces the grin to settle into something more neutral and even. Gold glares back, clearly unimpressed, his jaw snapped tightly shut. 

The clock continues to tick.

Hook shrugs, dropping the pretense, the game becoming boring as quickly as it had become interesting. Nothing seemed to be able to hold his attention for long, not even this.

“Ok, let's fight.” Hand flies up to knock the stick out of Gold’s hand away, the cane spinning wildly through the air to embed itself deeply into the wall. He can feel the pride radiating up within him from the darkness, how it is enjoying this. It wants more and Hook is more than happy to oblige. It wants the man dead, as neatly and as easily as he had dealt with the cane.

There was a plan, he had a plan. It had to mean something, this death. It wasn't like before, when he had seen a frantic chance and had taken it in a hurried stab, barely giving himself a second to savour the moment.

(Or before that, when he had realised he could never kill Rumplestiltskin. All he could do was kill his heart, kill Belle, and then wait for the crocodile to murder him in turn. When he hoped the beast would finish him and just end it all.)

Finally, he has the power. He is the one in control and he wants this to be more than some twist of his fingers, more than a snap of the cowards neck. He wants the crocodile to feel all the fear and pain Milah had felt, he wants him to suffer a fraction of the pain Hook has felt over the long years. He wants to really enjoy this moment, to linger in it. 

The darkness wants this now. Blood and pain and death. Getting what they both want and need. It enjoys theatrics but this is more important. Killing Gold is more important to it than anything. He has to strike down the beast now before it is too late.

Wait.

What.

Why is killing Gold so important to it?

_The blood. Remember to get the blood._

No. 

No, that isn’t it. He doesn’t need to kill to get blood. He wants to kill Rumplestiltskin, he will kill him, the whole point of his existence is to kill him. Hook doesn’t need the darkness to urge him on for this task so why does it care so much? 

Thoughts are scattered and lost by the sound of the door to the pawn shop bursting open, Belle standing there, a look of utter devastation on her face. 

\--

He should have known that the woman would try and interfere. It seems as if even the crocodile is capable of inspiring a real and fierce love within someone’s heart. How, Hook can’t even begin to guess. The woman is in full possession of her facilities as best he can tell. She isn't cursed or under any magical illusion. She even knows his crimes and yet she can somehow look past all that and see something... worthy within.

She is, from the time they spent together, a kind, good person. And she loves Rumplestiltskin. Hook knows that, knows how strongly she feels for her lover.

He has spent longer than he cared to admit, brooding on why Belle loved her crocodile even as they repeated the same dance steps over and over.

Why a monster like that had been able to find a love that was so close to true, when he had nothing but ashes. Until a certain golden haired woman held a knife to his throat and his heart had said something other than revenge.

Then again, someone had been foolish enough to fall for him eventually. Had thought they had seen something in him. It seems both women were fools in the end. 

_She is his weakness and he, hers. Love is a weakness, nothing more Hook, remember that._

(How can he forget? Love is the reason any of this is happening, love is the destructive force that has ruined all these lives. Love is the force that will destroy all the lives he plans to take.)

Hook steps forward, attention on the woman now, his crocodile all but forgotten bar a nudge of his gifts, pinning the man effortlessly in place against the counter. It wouldn’t do to have him try and stop this conversation. Or - knowing his cowardly nature - try and take the distraction Belle is causing to flee. Hook could quite simply catch up to him or just summon him back to the shop if he made such a run. In a way, it might almost be entertaining, to let his prey try and escape, to allow him to think that perhaps, just perhaps, he has escaped but no, Hook does not want that.

For some reason, something inside of him rebels at the thought of Belle having to suffer more than she needs. Her love must die. But she doesn't need to see him abandon her first in a bid to save his miserable skin.

She doesn't need to watch him die. Even Hook isn't that cruel.

“Please Killian, please don’t do this,” Belle begs, eyes welling up with tears that spill and overflow, trickling slowly down her face. That strange, rebellious, foreign feeling rises in him even stronger at the sight of her crying. That is wrong, he knows it even if Hook cannot say exactly why he knows it. All he knows for sure is he has to fix this. 

“Hush now, no more tears love,” Hook soothes. He lifts his left arm to gently brush away a stray tear with his hook, watching as she shuddered slightly at the contact. Belle cannot be here, she is interrupting his plans and this is not the stage for her. He takes a step backwards, away from her and suddenly the blue vial is in his hand, the potion he has spent so long making within.

“Rest now Belle,” he simply said, giving her no more warning as he tosses the glass container towards her, watching as it glimmered in the light of the shop. The bottle shatters upon impact at her feet, pale blue liquid running along the floor. He watches as it starts to curl around her shoes, the near translucent fluid apparently gaining a life of its own, climbing up her legs. There is just time for her to look back up at him in shock and betrayal, mouth opening to say - something. Hook moves before she can, hand lifting to summon red magic, the clouds mixing with the wetness to form a pale purple mist that envelops her form completely. Then, Belle is gone and the only thing he can hear is that clock still ticking.

“What did you do!”

And the sound of that. The crocodile, straining against the magical bonds, fighting and trying to reach towards the spot where Belle had been standing. Fear and disgust still colour his tone of course but there is something else, wrapped up in his words. 

Anger. Oh, that was new. That was... exciting. Hook had expected the other emotions but he hadn’t expected this. He couldn’t help but wonder if it was possible to fan these flames, to build the crocodile up into even more heightened emotions, all the better to crush him back down. It makes Hook want to explain the curse he had cast on Belle, eyes slanting doward to examine his nails for a moment, keeping himself calm.

“A sort of mini dark curse. Sent her over the town line. Somewhere, far, far away.” Hook smiles again, lips curling upward to bare his teeth at the man. It is almost a crime, how much he is enjoying this. “When she wakes she will have a new life, a new set of memories. None of which, involve you. She will live out her life never thinking of you, never mourning you. She will live a long life and die happy. Maybe once you are dead I shall go visit her... she clearly has a thing for dark, disgusting creatures.”

(He has moved her to an abandoned house on the other side of the town, caught in a deep yet temporary sleep. Hook cannot decide what to do with her. Tearing her completely from this town feels like it would be a punishment on both of them and he has little desire for that. Her mind lies open thanks to his spell, memories softened and blurred, all ready to be manipulated if he so desires. Perhaps he will remove the crocodile anyway, just to save her grieving. Then again, what does it matter what he does when he plans to burn this whole town by the end of his games?)

Hand suddenly tightens into a fist as he turns away and towards the timepiece that would not just shut up, the ticking clock exploding into its many tiny parts at the motion, cogs and springs bouncing outward. They spill over the display shelf, tinkling against each other as they fall to the floor, the ticking destroyed.

Silence. Blessed silence once more. 

Hook spins to face Rumplestiltskin once more, that crazy grin back on his features as thoughts of women were pushed firmly away.

“Now... where were we?”

\--

The boards of the Jolly Roger creak under foot as he roams the deck of his beloved ship. He hears more than just the strain and press of wood against his weight. He hears a voice almost in the groan and pull of sail and rope. His girl. The one he knew he could always rely on, the one that would always be by his side, no matter what. She has been here since the start. 

(The one he had thrown away in an instant for a magic bean. It was a miracle that the Jolly would even allow him to walk upon her once more, after that betrayal. He has hurt her so much, and for so little in return.) 

Back where it all began. The perfect place to end it all with his crocodile. The other man is huddled against the mast, bound by rope in another echo of the past while he gets everything ready. Excalibur is summoned from its hiding place, Hook enjoying the startled expression that appeared on Gold at the sight of it.

“Magnificent, isn’t it,” he told him, admiring the weapon for a few moments, tilting it this way and that to make the sunbeams bounce off the metal blade. The names are still proudly emblazoned against the otherworldly patterns, reminding him of his cursed fate. “Thanks to you helping Emma retrieve this, it can no longer control me. But it can kill me.”

A second blade is conjured up, a simple pirate sword lying beside the bound man at the mast.

“Two swords Crocodile. All you have to do is kill me with my own sword. It's better than the chance you gave me.”

(Back in time, in the Enchanted Forest, the monster had done more than give him a chance. He had turned away from the chance to kill Hook, had actually released him instead of strangling him slowly and painfully to death, simply on for the hope of finding his son once more. Even when he had inevitably betrayed them, he had simply locked them up instead of killing Hook as he no doubt wanted to.

Only Hook - and _her_ \- remember that moment. When the Crocodile had shown mercy after a fashion, out of love. He still can't process it - even years later.)

Two fingers press together, pads rubbing each other, the ropes uncoiling themselves at his whim, allowing the crocodile to slowly inch out of them. His movements are unsteady without his cane, a shuffling step towards the weapon that has been left to him.

The limp makes Hook frown and no, no, no, that will not do. He wants this to be fair after all. Striking down a cripple is hardly the stuff of a worthy battle. A slight stirr of his mind, push of magic is all it takes to heal the old wound, to allow the other man to move as freely as possible. It is amazing really, what this magic can do, the lengths it is capable of. Aside from bringing someone back from the dead, there seems no limit to his power and Hook longs to stretch himself. To allow the magic free reign and see just what he is truly capable of. Curing an injury is child’s play it seems. 

It plants a seed of an idea in his mind, Hook pushing it to his subconscious to allow it to blossom there. Whatever he is thinking up will come to him in time. 

“What say you crocodile? Shall we dance?”

“Let's.”

How cute, the crocodile is pretending to be brave again. Perhaps the freedom of movement has given him this boost of confidence, perhaps it is whatever Swan did to him to get him to retrieve the sword from the stone in the first place. Either way, it looks as though Hook is going to get some decent entertainment out of this as he toys with the imp like a cat with a mouse. 

Excalibur lifts up to his face, a second of warning before Hook is lunging forward, letting his feet dance gracefully across the deck. They parry back and forth, the whole of the ship their fighting arena. For the moment, Hook is simply playing with the man, his swings and lunges designed to be blocked. A single cut from his sword would end things and that would ruin the fun too quickly. He cannot help but regret using this sword a little, forcing him to hold back and draw the moment out. If only he had a sword like the one Gold is wielding, one he could use to slash and slash and slash. How many delightful lines of red he could create, how much blood he could spill without actually finishing him off. The agony and fear that Gold is feeling could be physical as well as mental.

He is only half paying attention on the sword Gold is wielding, the thing little more than an annoying fly buzzing around his person as they move over decking. Perhaps that is why Hook doesn’t block this thrust in time, tip of the sword piercing his clothes and entering his body.

Laugh is the closest he has come to actual humour as he feels the blade sink into his chest, Hook leaning forward and putting more and more of his weight on the sword, allowing it to go deeper into his body until the hilt is almost buried in him. Really, Hook hadn’t believed the little worm had it in him. 

The look on Gold’s face is _priceless_. Almost as though he had somehow forgotten in the heat of the fight that Hook was an immortal now and that his sword is nothing but a set piece. It could be made of straw, for all the good it will do against him. Hook swings with his left arm, the metal of his hook connecting with the crocodile's head, causing him to stagger backwards, hand unconsciously letting go of his weapon.

Excalibur clatters to the deck, discarded because now Hook has the chance to deal actual, non fatal damage, the chance to make him feel agony lacing through his body. The chance is just too good to pass up, Hook barely blinking as he tugs the sword roughly free from his chest. He steps back, flicking the blade up, some small, sick part of him almost regretful that the blood on it isn’t from a fatal wound he suffered. Hook doesn’t get to die today, although some part of him longs to. 

Almost too late, he realises his error, sees the way Gold’s eyes light up at the sight of Excalibur abandoned on the deck between them. Sees the way the other man drives forward in a desperate bid to gain control of the weapon. Hook is ready to die, but not like this. Not unless he takes his foe with him.

The Crocodile is fast. Hook is faster. Sword swings down in a delightful arc, metal singing in the air as he slashes down at the hand curling around the hilt of the ornate sword, the wrist too tempting a target to pass up. 

The scream that rips the air is music to his ears.

As is the sight of the right hand that now lies abandoned on the deck, Gold writhing in pain a few feet away, clutching desperately at a bloodied stump where once his hand had been attached. The rich red thick liquid pools around him as the man drops to his knees, his breath jagged and harsh. 

(Who would have thought the dried up husk of a man would have so much blood in him?)

Hook doesn’t remember blood when his hand was taken. The blade had felt unnaturally hot in that split second it had sliced skin and cracked bone, a clean cut that had near sent him crazy from the pain.

(He thinks maybe the pain did send him insane. It would be easier to blame his choices on a sick mind.)

“A fair trade to start with I suppose,” Hook muses, sending away both swords with a swish of his hand. He crouches on the deck, cold eyes flickering between the man still writhing in agony and the detached hand.

“I think... I will take this.” He as no need for the limb, the blood on the sword will be more than enough for the ritual but the chance to take a trophy is just too good to pass up. Plus, leaving it lying around might inspire Swan to try and do the noble thing and fix it. As if she has to go running around cleaning up after him - as if he needs or deserves that. 

_You wouldn’t need to worry about that if you just end this. Kill him now,_ hisses the black, impatient for this to be done. _You took a hand, you tasted your revenge now kill him as you have waited so long to do._

No.

What was it the crocodile had said to him? That he wanted him to suffer? Hook wasn’t ready for the games to end, Gold might be suffering now, might be in agony at the loss of a limb but it was still barely a taste of the pain that Hook had endured since that day on the Jolly Roger.

_Kill him! Kill!_

Death was too good for Gold. Too quick.

No matter what the darkness said, no matter what it wanted. He didn’t want to kill him just yet. It makes the darkness howl, clawing and stabbing at his mind, a pain that threatens to set him reeling and buckling to the ground but Hook forces himself to stand back up, tall and proud against the pain. 

(That little voice in the corner of his mind that was neither Hook nor Dark One, didn’t want to kill Rumplestiltskin, called it wrong. Said they were better than this now.) 

This isn’t mercy. It isn’t a kindness, or an admittance they were wrong. Hook wants the man to suffer, wants him to live a cripple as he had been a cripple. He wants him to look over his shoulder and live in fear of when Hook would return to finish the game. 

But if he bleeds out slowly, painfully here, then Hook will accept that as a fitting end. Not the end he would pick, but an end that might sate a fraction of him. It was time to roll the dice and see where they landed. 

A blood sacrifice to his beloved ship, an apology in sound and gore. For everything Hook had put her though, thanks to this man.

\--

“Because that is what this family does. We fight and we keep on trying and hoping and we are going to get him back Emma. We are going to save you both,” Snow declares, Hook catching the tail end of what was no doubt a most moving and heart warming speech. The type he had heard the heroes deliver when they needed to rouse the troops before one more valiant push. Perhaps they have something planned then, maybe they actually found something in one those books that could defeat him, trap him in a cage like some pet, just as they had once done to the crocodile.

(It stings a little, to know that they had so clearly held back when they considered Emma an enemy but are now so eager to wipe him from the map, so easily see him in one dimension. It shouldn't hurt, but it does.)

He stays silent, standing out of sight as he watches the scene unfold. Snow draws Emma in for a hug and for a moment she simply stands there, a stiff figure in black, holding tight against the embrace. Then, he sees something seem to dissolve in the young woman, her shoulders sagging as she finally accepts the comfort, her arms lifting up to clutch at her mother, clinging to her tightly. Hook swears he can hear the sound of muffled cries coming from his Swan, sobs stifled by sheer force of will.

It is so sweet. Sickeningly so, and it makes Hook want to gag. Suddenly he cannot take it anymore, cannot stand to watch Emma take this comfort while he is forever burning in his icy hell.

Hook steps out from the darkened corner he had been lurking in, hook and hand clapping very slowly together, sarcastic expression on his face. 

“Bravo M’lady, bravo. How touching. Really brings a tear to the eye,” he said, lifting his hand to wipe an imaginary tear away from his face. All eyes are now on him, but more importantly, the soft moment between mother and daughter has been broken. 

“Killian! It’s alright, we fig-”

“Hush lad, grown ups are talking.” Hook dismisses Henry without another word, turning away to show his back to the the teenager, fingers barely twitching as he does. Out of the corner of his eye, Hook can see Henry’s mouth still moving, jaw working but no sound escaping. He can feel the exact moment the atmosphere shifts around them as the adults in the room realise that Henry is not willingly being silent. It is as though the temperature physically drops a few degrees, a breath of silence before the world explodes into noise and movement.

Emma spins, her attention completely consumed by her son, rushing over to him. David is suddenly right in his face, one hand grabbing at the collar of the thick leather duster he is wearing, gripping it so tight his knuckles are turning white. Hook is amused to see that David is brandishing his gun with his other hand, waving the weapon around in what he can only assume is a ridiculous attempt to threaten or protect. He almost tells Dave to just pull the trigger already. Shoot him in the face and see what happens.

(If only they could be lucky, blood and gore everywhere, a heavy thud as body hits the ground and then peace for all. If only the toxic sludge coursing through his body would allow such a thing.)

_What fools these mortals be. We could take the gun Hook. Just to show them who is in charge here._

Snow is by her husbands side of course, standing as tall as her height allows, a proud expression on her face. Supporting him and it reminds Hook of all the times Milah would stand beside him on the top deck of the Jolly, his Queen offering her own brand of support. 

(It reminds him of all the times he would stand next to Emma, supporting her, loving her. He misses that.)

Eyes flick away from the parents to settle on Swan, on the way she has not even glanced in his direction, fussing over her son instead. He has no right to be jealous of the lad. He doesn’t care what Swan feels for the lad, so what if Henry comes first, Henry has always come first, as the son should. He has never cared before, he can dimly recall a time when she had refused to accept his feelings, refused to even consider the idea of the two of them because she had to focus on Henry. She chose Henry, and had told him she would always pick her son first. Hook can remember how awestruck that made him feel, how he had fallen that little bit more in love with her. How he loved that she loved her child.

He can feel a little tick in his jaw, a tiny twitch as he watches Swan try and lift the enchantment he has cast. Why does it matter now, that she is still in love with her son? Why does it matter if he pushes her further away? Isn't that the point? To hurt her? Why does it matter?

_It doesn't matter._

(That little voice screams once more. It matters. It matters. He matters.)

Hook clears his throat, eyeing the gun in his face for a couple of seconds before lifting a hand to casually push it aside, a soft scoffing sound in the back of his throat at the pathetic attempt to intimidate him. Taking the gun as the voices suggested is tempting, but that will just lead to more shouting, more movement and reactions when really he wants everyone still and focused on his bombshell.

“Unfortunately you are a bit behind in the game love. Revenge is so sweet, is it not? Might want to pop on over to the Jolly, Swan. I left you a gift. If you hurry, you might even get there before he completely bleeds out.” 

If Swan has to clean up his mess, if she is determined to stand by him, to fix him, then it will be on his own, twisted terms. There is nothing to fix but if she wants to try then he will leave her a trail of broken and bloody bodies to find. He will show her what kind of man he truly is, and he will prove himself once more the superior of Gold by not completely rigging the dice in his favour. He is saving his loaded die for a different game.

\--

Robin is not looking his best.

They cannot stay in the farmhouse. It is the target of Regina’s anger and magic. She may be no match for him one on one, but his attention is split across the whole town, so many targets, so many lives to ruin. He cannot put the required energy and magic into keeping this place protected and go about his daily business. No, he will have to move Robin, spirit him away somewhere else and keep the wards up to distract Regina.

The smile that curls on his lips at imagining her reaction when she finally breaks into the farm only to be confronted by empty space is unashamedly evil, Hook almost shivering with pleasure. He hopes he will be able to see it.

That doesn’t solve the problem of what to do with Robin in the meantime. Where to hide him, keep him safe in a very unsafe manner. This has turned into more than just distracting Regina, there are plots and subplots brewing under the surface of his mind.

The idea, when it comes to him, is so brilliant, so blindingly obvious that he is ashamed he hadn’t thought of it before. 

The pawn shop. Who would think he would use the lair of his mortal enemy to hide in? It stinks of the crocodile, of magic that makes his skin crawl and want to scrub himself violently clean. All around him are the trophies the monster has collected over his life, the artifacts belonging to other people, things no doubt used to taunt and hurt. Just as everyone knows his views on the crocodile, they all know how unwillingly he visits this place, Swan knows how desperation is what has driven him here in the past. It disgusts Hook on every level, making bile rise up in his throat.

It is perfect.

The back room might only be separated by a curtain, but the fabric is thick, reaches the floor and effectively cuts the room off. Thanks to the magic now in him, it is child's play to summon his captive from the farmhouse to here, the man collapsing in a rather ungainly heap against one of the walls. 

Thick, heavy cuffs settle around the wrists of the archer, chains appearing out of thin air and tracing from the shackles back to the wall, easily restraining him. Hook considers a gag before settling for simply enchanting the room to be soundproof. Let the fool scream if he so wishes. Somehow, he doesn't think Robin will, not unless he believes there is a chance someone is nearby who will hear him. Robin is not the sort to waste energy like that.

He is too proud to debase himself unnecessarily, not if he thinks it might cause his captor amusement. He doesn’t know that hearing Robin scream will not amuse him, no matter how much the darkness might savour it, and Hook is not going to enlighten him on a potential weakness he might have. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t. He just has to keep chanting it until it becomes true.

Robin is still not looking well. Something inside of Hook is tugging incessantly at him, demanding he focus on the pale skin and slightly shallow breaths, the way he keeps flicking his tongue out to try and wet lips that now that he thinks about it, seem very dry and cracked. The man can barely seem to summon the energy to keep his head up.

Oh. Food. Water. Right.

Man cannot live off revenge alone.

That honour goes to Dark Ones.

A veritable feast is summoned in a blink of an eye, the best and rarest of delicies from across the lands, along with the more simple, comfort food that he knows the man likes. If Robin is a condemned man then the least Hook can do is make sure he has a good send off.

“I'm sorry, I'm being a terrible host,” Hook said, crouching down next to the other man who is eyeing the food laid out in front of him with understandable mistrust. There is nothing Hook can say to convince him that it is edible, safe, he knows the legends and warnings about Dark Ones as well as anyone else. All Hook can do is leave the food there and wait for desperation to win out over fear. He hopes that Robin isn’t too stubborn, isn't as stubborn as he himself would be - if he was in the Crocodile’s power he would have rather died than eat anything on offer.

A shame really, that it has come to this. 

Robin has never done anything in particular to harm him - aside from that arrow in the back, which was still a very rude thing to do but then Hook did understand. For as much as he might not get the romance between the pair, he knows Robin loves Regina. Just as he knows there is no tactic too underhand, no move too dirty he would not use to keep the woman he loves safe.

A shame still, that this man has ended up in his crosshairs, this man who had once joked with him, talked with him, offered him advice, listened to his pain.

(In that other life, they were almost friends.)

“Regina thinks I want to kill you and am planning to do so.” Words are idly spoken, almost directed at the wall about Robin’s head than at Robin himself. He has no idea why he is telling him this, what has possessed him to share this story. 

“Where did she get that idea from?” The voice is hoarse, scratchy and it makes Hook wince a little internally to hear it, to know he is the cause. He doesn't allow himself to react outwardly through, refuses to let so much a flicker of doubt or regret pass across his features. Nobody can ever know he has feelings still.

“Probably from the way in which I said I was going to kill you,” Hook admits, voice never changing from its cheery sound, grin growing. Oh it had been funny to imply that to Regina, to make her think she was so close to loosing her heart. He wants to hurt Regina in a way he doesn’t wish harm on Robin, wants the Evil Queen to suffer for everything she did to him back when she ruled. Everything she made him do, the games she made him play, the way she would make him dance to her whims. He wants her to suffer for everything she did to Swan too, for hurting her.

(She didn’t make him do that final murder. She set the pieces up to fall true, had offered him that most vile of things, a deal but she had never forced him to commit that crime.

At the end of the day, it had been Hook and Hook alone who had ended his father's life. It hadn't even been about revenge for Milah, he hadn't been thinking about that. It had been rage, something deep and dark, pure and simple that had made him snap and ruin yet another family.)

Don’t worry old bean,” Hook tells him, tone shifting at last, mimicking Robin’s accent as best he can, a grim parody of the man. He shifts a little closer, leaning in as his voice drops to a near whisper. “I'm not going to kill you.”

Robin squints at him, gaze unsure. He knows better than to hope though, better than to think that means he is going to be set free. Fringe falls into Hook’s eyes, shadowing blue eyes further as he watches his victim carefully.

“I have something else in mind for you.” Words are not comforting but then Hook does not mean them to be. They are the truth, nothing more. Raw and fragmented, but the truth.

He leaves without telling Robin anything else.

\--

For once, Hook isn’t trying to further his terrible plans. He denies himself nothing anymore. He wishes to be calmed by the water and so he will be. The sight of the gentle waves has always calmed him in the past, pace slowing as he reaches the edge of the dock and stares out at the great expanse of blue. Hook needs these moments, staring out at the water and letting the sight of them settle his internal storm. He is blaming that for why he didn’t notice Swan’s approach until the other Dark One is standing right next to him. She stares out towards the water with him, silent, as still as a statue.

Every inch of him is on high alert, Hook unable to resist glancing out of the corner of his eye at her. This is new, this is different, and he isn't sure what to make of it. She has come for a purpose, that much he is certain of, something beyond the pair of them, the ruined relationship that lies between them. There is a strength in the way she stands that tells him this isn’t about her feelings. Finally, Swan speaks.

“He's still alive.”

He doesn’t need to ask who she is talking about. 

Hook had known, in the back of his mind, that the Crocodile had survived. They are so tightly linked, the pair of them, their destinies so intertwined that he feels as though he would be able to sense it when the Crocodile finally departs this world. He will feel the cord between them snap and break when the miserable creature finally shuffles off this mortal coil.

A cocktail of emotions rise up in him, conflicted emotions swirling around and around in his mind. They surge and fall so rapidly, the shifting sands that have become his thoughts making him feel a little dizzy, undertain on his feet. There is rage, despair, fury that the creature clings so tenaciously to life. A hot fissure of hurt to think that the worm lives because Swan had rushed to save his life. Yet again, she had chosen another over him, had put her own wishes and desires over his, no matter how dark and twisted they actually were. Just once, he wanted to be the one she listened to, agreed with, instead of forever going her own way. There are other emotions too. Excitement, anticipation... and something else, something light, a sparkling of bubbles rising up in him, something more than just giddiness. He can’t put a name to this feeling.

(Relief is the strange, bubbly feeling in his chest. One less murder on his conscious.)

“Are you going to try again?”

Hook blinked a couple of times as he tries to work out if he heard her right. Was this truly his Swan? She would know better than to ask such a truly stupid question surely? Eyebrow climbs high on his forehead as he finally turns to face her fully. The surprise at her having to ask is written all over his face and clearly answer enough for her. She sighs, sound frustrated and Hook is torn between anger that she still acts as though he is so unreasonable in wanting his Crocodile to suffer, and the urge to just laugh hysterically at the asburity of the moment. To think she is going to scold a Dark One as one would a child, on the subject of murder. 

“Killian...

“Hook,” he corrects her, and it is strange, how strong this urge is. The need to finally make her _understand_. They are stuck going around and around in circles until she understands how things have changed - or maybe that should be, how things have been made clear at long last. He is not Killian Jones. He has not been Killian Jones for a very long time now. There is no hope for her unless she realises it. She has to move on from him. She needs to be strong for what lies ahead. 

“Killian Jones is dead. Don't worry love, it wasn't you that killed him. He died long, long ago. Before you even met in fact. You fell in love with a ghost, nothing more.”

“No... does... does that mean you don't love me anymore?” Words are mumbled more than anything else, slipping out sound by sound. It makes her seem... small almost, pressed down by doubts and pain. He has seen her hurting more times than he cares to remember and it is never like this. Her pain is fire, just as his tends to be, it explodes out of her in great spurts of flame. All the previous strength of mere moments ago has faded away now that she is confronted with some personal, painful. The darkness has to be whispering to her, spinning its spiderwebs of lies and half truths, pressing down on tender spots to cause pain. 

There is no other reason for why she sounds so broken, worn down. She has loved and lost before. Why is this any different?

“Of course I still love you.” Hook can't help the almost insulted expression that crosses his features at the idea that his feelings might have changed. He is constant in his loves and hates if nothing else, and feels them both with endless passion. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see the Dark Presence as he has taken to calling it, standing there, a mocking expression on its scaly features. It lifts a hand to wave at the pair of them, Swan apparently oblivious to its presence. 

Although this version doesn't speak, he can still hear the darkness, hissing and spitting in the back of his mind, a single word rising up against the noise. 

_Milah..._

He scowls, and it wasn't as though he had forgotten his first love. He could never forget his love.

(He had before. When this woman had turned him into some pathetic pale reflection of himself, when he had allowed himself to think that perhaps he could be better than this. When he sought to be more than a miserable gutter rat.)

Love isn’t enough. This world is a cold, cruel place and love brings him only pain and purpose. There is hope in Swans eyes now, hope born of his words and that will just not do. Hook shrugs, eyebrow still artfully raised as he delivers his next well aimed stab.

“I just hate you more though. Love, hate, it's a fine line after all.”

(He hates himself for having to do this. Then again, what else is new.)

“If you love me then it's not too late,” Emma pleads and he cannot help the heavy sigh that slips from his lips. He had thought - hoped - that she might finally understand. Not everything was a fairytale and not every story had a happy ending. Their ending was blood and fire and death, he could see it in his mind's eye. The bloody day was fast approaching and still, she wasn’t ready for it.

“Just because I love you, doesn't mean we belong together or that we work together,” he explained, words slow as though speaking to a child. She truly is her mother’s daughter, despite the lack of actually having a mother to guide her through her formative years. Perhaps some part of her had always known, perhaps the endless, sickening hope that emitted from Snow had somehow sunk into her during the long months of pregnancy. Hope will get her killed. He takes a few steps, closing the small gap between them.

“You are poison Swan.” Hook is completely in her personal space now, crowding up against her. His hand lifts to brush against her cheek, thumb catching the solitary tear that slowly trickles down her cheek. The rush of emotions in him has trickled to a stop as well, everything good and bad fading away as he watches her. To outsiders, this moment must seem intimate, the pair almost entwined together. Voice drops to a breathy whisper as he leans close, so close to her that he could kiss her cheek if he just tilted his head even a fraction. “And I am even worse.”

\--

It surprises him that Regina takes this long to break through the magic covering the farmhouse. He can feel when it pops, a slight exhale of air as the final seal gives way, the last of his protective wards dropping and the house unwraps itself like a gift to her. What a shame for her hopes and dreams that she is not as powerful as she had previously thought. How different things would have played out if only she had been powerful enough to break his spells before he moved her boy.

He gives her some time to fully search the building before willing himself over to the farmhouse for a little conversation. 

The devastation she has managed to wreck in that short time is truly a sight to behold.

Idly, he finds himself hoping that Zelena isn't too attached to any of the items Regina appears to have set ablaze in sheer frustration. He also finds himself mourning the woman she had once been, before she had gone soft and weak. If only she still wore her glittering crown, hid her heart behind diamond steel walls. What fun they could have had if only the timings had been better, if the curse had taken him sooner or she had remained strong, the tarnished jewel that her mother had so lovingly crafted. He could have used the Evil Queen to further his own plans quite happily.

(But then again, he does not need her like that. There is another who will suit his purpose just as well.)

“Oh, too slow. Better luck next time your highness.” Hook smirks as he finally finds her near the storm cellar, even those doors ripped open in her quest. The woman spins wildly around to face him, dark hair creating a mask over her features for a moment, her movements lacking the normal grace and poise he has come to associate with Regina. The fury that burns in her eyes is familiar enough however, along with the tiny step towards him and the fire that she effortless conjuries up. This is what he wants. He is restless, nervous energy all pent up inside of him after his conversation with Swan and he longs for a fight. Regina should be able to hold her own for a few seconds at least, hopefully long enough to deal with this itch. He shifts slightly, slipping into a fighting stance. Hook is feeling generous he decides - he will even let her get the first attack in. Ladies first. 

To his surprise, she clenches her fist, extinguishing the flame that had flickered so hungrily in her palm. It is enough to spark his curiosity, to stop him from just attacking or finding some new biting remark to attempt to wound her with. Regina has something planned and well, he has never been able to control his curiosity. It’s going to cost him one of these days but he just has to see what she has planned. He watches with interest as she takes a couple of deep, apparently calming breaths. 

“You can't do this Killian.”

“Hook,” he growls and he will not have that name spoken aloud. It is as though he is going round in circles with this town. Time and time again he shows his dark side, he makes someone bleed, he casts magic on children and yet still they persist in calling him by a human name, instead of his title. He can barely stand to hear it from Swan, stops her every time. Only those who loved him can speak that name and they are all dead now, along with the man that bore it. Eyes narrow into cold slits as he stares at her, trying to work out what this new game is, what she hopes to achieve from her words. Regina barely pauses for breath, barrolling on with what she needs to say.

“I know you are angry and hurting, but trust me, what you are planning will not fix any of those feelings beating in your heart. Trust me. I've been there, Hook. I know you. I used to be you.”

So, she thinks to... what exactly? Move him with kindness? Appeal to him as one would be reformed villain to another? There lay the difference between them of course. 

He no longer wishes to be redeemed.

(That annoying flea bite of a voice whispers, _lies_.)

“I know what you've done in the past, I know how far you’ve sunk and I know how far you have managed to rise up in turn. You won’t hurt these people Hook, you can’t destroy another family, don’t forget I know what you di-” Her voice cuts off, a wheezing, gasping sound filling the air around them as she suddenly claws at her neck, fighting for breath. Hook feels he has been more than kind, more than generous. He had allowed his curiosity to get the better of him and she repaid him with reminding him of his darkest, most disgusting deeds. 

“You know I killed my own father and you think somehow that means I won’t ruin these families?” Question slips out despite himself, although the magic slowly throttling her still holds strong. Her logic makes no sense. She knows and acknowledges what he is capable of, what he has done and that means he won’t do it again? Ridiculous, utterly ridiculous. He should kill her now and be done with it - but even Regina has a role still to play, and he needs her alive for later.

_We will kill her later. Drain her dry, as we planned. Patience Hook, patience._

Teeth grind together as he tries to decide what to do. It is almost off putting, to have the Darkness suggest restraint, to push him towards not killing. He will not kill her. Not today. Fingers relax, releasing her throat and allowing the woman a few precious seconds to draw in much needed air. Only a few seconds however. Hook throws his arm out with a little more force than is perhaps strictly necessary, sending her flying down the steps of the storm cellar. Her body hits almost every step as she falls, crumpling to a heap at the bottom. Like a broken and discarded doll, legs and arms at haphazard angles, she lies there, eyes closed. 

He waits long enough to be certain her chest is rising and falling in a regular pattern before stomping off, unsatisfied by the resolution chosen. It is not enough, not punishment enough for the memories she has dared to bring back to the surface, to the swirl of negative emotions that not even the darkness can control. 

\--

His head feels as though it might explode at any moment.

There is a war going on inside and the mental mindscape is the battlefield, ripped open, scarred and bloody. Regina’s words have lit some fuse inside of him, and that has set his whole psyche alight, a raging inferno that threatens to consume him once more. How many more times must he walk through fire before he is burnt completely away? Surely enough must eventually become enough.

Voices scream into the void. The Darkness mingles with his own, a sound of fury and impotence. Then, there is the other. Softer than his own, quieter than either of the other two as it offers opinions that almost always conflict with the darkness, the black easily submerging it, even if only for a few seconds. It is stubborn though, he has to give it that. Despite its weak volume, it screams and screams to be heard until the voice is raw and broken. And then, it screams some more, refusing to give up until he has at least acknowledge what it has to say, even if he doesn’t actually listen. 

(He has listened to it more often than he cares to admit over the last few hours. It points out far too many inconvenient truths and Hook does not know what to do with that. All he knows is the voice makes the darkness furious and that alone is worth keeping it around.)

Hook stares at the shop window in front of him. The pawn shop. How had be gotten here? Hook can’t remember walking or using his magic, can remember nothing after storming off after attacking Regina. A nothingness fills his memories after this point and now he finds himself here, drawn to this place. 

Eyes are wide, frantic and almost unseeing as he reaches for Robin, easily dragging him to his feet by his collar. He is not gentle with his motions, uncaring of the way fabric rips slightly under the force or the strangled noise Robin cuts off half way through. 

Hook needs to understand, and not just what Regina had hoped to achieve by cutting open such a painful wound. Regina was once the Evil Queen. She was a monster and he knows she was originally to blame for the death of Robin’s wife. Even if that is not exactly how it played out thanks to their time travelling meddling, her death is at the very least partly Regina’s fault. No matter how much she tries to be good now, how can he possibly love a woman with so much blood on her hands? How can he possibly forgive all the sins she has commited - how can Belle forgive the man she loves?

“How do you do it? How do you love her despite the things the Evil Queen did?” Words are almost snarled into Robin’s face, any control having long since slipped away. There is a tense few seconds between them, Hook giving his prisoner a little shake when it seems as though he won't answer the question. Then Robin looks directly at him, a spark of defiance glowing in his eyes, something that makes Hook want to pull away, suddenly regretting asking the question.

“How do you love Emma still?”

The question - or maybe just an answer - sends him reeling, mentally and physically, numb fingers letting go of Robin’s shirt collar. The archer drops limply without any support to keep him upright, a dull thud as he connects heavily to the ground.

It is not the same thing.

It isn’t. It can’t be. How dare Robin compare Regina to Emma, how dare he match crime for crime. His Swan might be a Dark One but her actions have been little more than childish tantrums compared to the Queen. So what if Swan had done terrible things, if the worst thing had been changing him, it still isn't the same thing.

(Milah had done terrible things in her lifetime too and that hadn’t altered his feelings for her one jolt. Most of them had been committed while she had been aboard the Jolly with him - a pirate’s life was not for the faint of heart or the overly morally inclined. And while she had never outright murdered someone for sport, had never come anywhere close to the levels of Rumpelstiltskin, the Evil Queen or hell, even Captain Hook himself, she had still done wrong. She had abandoned her own flesh and blood as though Baelfire was nothing. It didn’t matter how much Milah truly regretted it, the crime had been done. Just as his own father had once abandoned him. While it hadn’t been to slavery, it had been to a miserable existence with a coward who had somehow become the great evil.

Hook - Killian as he had been then - had loved her all the same, despite knowing full well what she had done. Maybe it was the same thing.)

Robin’s arm is shaking as he tries to push himself upright again, refusing to show any weakness if he can help it. Hook feels even more unsettled now, body acting independently of his thoughts, barely aware of his leg pulling back to kick Robin heavily in the chest, forcing the man back to the ground with a muffled grunt. Hook is beating his enemies, he is leaving them scrambling in the dust, chained or broken. He is winning so why does he feel so empty about it?

The darkness whispers in his mind, the fleabite silenced, worn down for the moment by its efforts. The inky black always knows what to say, how to distract his internal thoughts, but the idea it has planted in his mind is just too delicious to ignore. He should have done this the moment he learnt of it, hand lifting to run through unruly hair. Robin can wait for now, let him consider his ill chosen words - Hook has bigger fish to fry now.

\--

This town never ceases to surprise him.

Rumpelstiltskin had survived a murder attempt, everyone knew that Hook was bound to try again - he had admitted as much to Swan. 

And yet these isn't even a token guard outside the room they are housing the worm. It would have been useless but Hook had honestly expected them to at least try.

Maybe they are secretly hoping he will just kill his Crocodile and be done with it. After everything the former Dark One has done to these people, there must be many who would be thankful to see him dead. Too cowardly or hypocritical to commit the dead themselves or allow it to happen if they knew about it.

But perfectly happy to look the other way and claim ignorance.

He cannot wait to rub this is David's face - as the law, this lack of security surely falls on him most of all.

It makes him chuckle, something dark and low in the back of his throat as he pushes down on the handle of the door, entering with a flourish, the door magically shutting and locking behind him. Even if someone should discover him, they won't be able to enter until he is ready.

Hook’s smile only grows wider at the sight of his victim in the hospital bed, the crocodile looking small and feeble amongst the bedding and machinery. He seems shrunken somehow, pale and worn out by recent events and there, atop the covers, lies his arm. A stump at the end, covered in bandages that are slowly being stained red. Seeing the results of the fight just make Hook shiver in delight. 

“Why are you here pirate, come to finish the job?” Although Gold’s tone holds a sneer, the machines he is hooked up to betray him, the noises increasing in a frantic tempo as his heart races away from him.

“Surprisingly no,” Hook replies, almost mesmerized by the sounds and the sight of that arm, negative space where a hand should be. He steps closer, coat swishing behind him, a wave of his hand cutting the cord that is connected to the button by the monsters remaining hand. He has no desire to alert people sooner than he has to, just in case one of them has the bright idea of contacting Swan and forcing him to cut his games short. He might not know a lot about this world compared to others, but Hook has been in enough of these hospitals to have learnt a thing or two about how they work. The button brings the nurses and that just will not do. 

The bowl of uneaten jello by the crocodile’s bed makes him hesitate for a second, a strange pang striking him heavily in the chest at the sight of it.

He forces his eyes away from the innocent looking green cubes and back towards his enemy. Even now, he can feel the darkness behind his eyes, the surging of powerful tides and the urge to kill. To stop playing with his prey and end it. It’s howl's are all but deafening, but the sheer determination of them in turn gives him more strength, ignites that ever present curiosity that has led him down so many dark and dangerous paths in the past. It wants him dead almost as much as Hook wants him dead. Strange. 

“It's funny, it really wants you dead crocodile. You must really have angered it, maybe by not giving it what it wants?” Hook asks, looking down to apparently examine his nails. Eyes slant back up after a few seconds, watching the other man. He sees how the already pale skin somehow manages to become several shades whiter. He sees the sharp intake of breath as Hook’s words sink in.

“No...” Gold breathes, shaking his head slightly in disbelief. “Not even you would be that stupid, that reckless.”

Why wouldn’t Rumplestiltskin have wanted this? A Dark One might not be able to cross realms, or bring people back from the dead, but that was one Dark One. All the Dark Ones? All that power? Hook refuses to believe that this is nothing beyond the scope of such a group, nothing they were incapable of. They would be Gods. 

_Coward_ , The Darkness hisses, pure rage radiating from that one word, the strength of the single word making him flinch slightly, eyes closing for a moment as he sought to centre himself again. _Even with us to guide him, support him, grant him all our power. He was still a miserable coward at the end of it, too afraid of the glory that would come. Nothing more._

(If even the Crocodile thinks this is a bad idea, if it is too evil, too dark, even for him, then perhaps Hook shouldn’t be so eager to go through with it.)

“But enough about that, back to the whole reason I came.” He grins, needing to shift the topic away from that, waving his hand with a flourish. The bandages wrapped around the stump at the end of the crocodile’s arm vanish with the motion, showing the bloody and bruised stump. Purple patterns blossom against the pale skin, tiny black stitches crisscrossing the wound. 

“Such craftsmanship,” Hook admires, both of them knowing that he is not talking about the work of the doctors. 

Another click of his fingers is all it takes to keep the Crocodile pinned in place, the beeping somehow managing to increase in speed yet again as he realised just how trapped and helpless he was. Fear truly was as intoxicating as rum. 

“I have a gift for you Crocodile.” Hook tells him, enjoying the beeping, as if it was music to ensnare his soul. Hand presses against hook, the tip digging into the center of the palm as Hook focused all of his magic, his attention on his own blood as it wells up in the small wound he has created. Blood for blood. This is different to what the Crocodile had done for him once long ago, but then he doesn’t want his enemy to realise what the gift is until the last possible second. Most of the magic is mere set dressing anyway. He smears the blood over his hook, feeling the magic build up and up in him. How many times has he had this old hook enchanted now? It’s amazing the thing isn’t magical in its own right by this point.

Hook leans down. Brushes the tip of his hook across the bruised and battered stump. Digs in to one of the larger sets of black stitches and pulls, ripping them out as magic engulfs them both. The world seems to shift on its axis, a rushing sense of vertigo passing through him and for a moment Hook feels violently sick. It passes. 

He steps back. The stump is gone, the Crocodile’s recently detached hand back at the end of his arm. 

“I would say beware the evil hand, but let's face it, every scrap of you is evil.” Hook tells him, trying to steady his breathing and calm the feeling of disgust in him. He had returned the hand. He had healed his worse enemy, had undone the physical damage caused. It had been the whole point of his visit, but Hook still feels sickened that he had done that.

“What do you want?” Gold whispers, eyes firmly fixed on his restored hand. 

“You’ve heard the tale of Prometheus I take it? Bit of an insult to the old man to compare you to him, but there we go.” Hook picks up the chart at the bottom of the bed, using his metal appendage to flick through the pages, pretending to read the words. All that matters is that Gold will live and now has been made whole again. For the moment. Hook gives a small smile as he continues his tale. 

“Every morning the eagle would peck out his liver, every day Prometheus would feel it like it's the first time and by the next morning it has regrown, ready to be devoured again.”

“The eagle dies at the end of that story.” Gold interrupts, a sudden burst of courage giving him the strength he needs to speak, voice dry and a little raspy. Hook freezes, every inch of him stiffening into a tense line. How dare the worm talk back. 

“Good thing I'm not an eagle then, crocodile.” He hisses, anger burning in his eyes as he fixes him with a glare. The Crocodile should be groveling, should be begging for mercy or shedding tears of thanks that Hook had seen fit to return what he had taken. As quickly as it appeared, the rage passes again, Hook forcing himself to smile as he thinks of the future. He will get him begging yet.

“I’m going to take an eye next I think. I’ll return it eventually. Maybe after I will just take some fingers. A foot one time. I’ll have to skin you at least once, as much as I can remove without killing you. I’ll give everything back, only to take it again and again and again. That will be fun, won't it.” 

At least until this town is done. Hook doesn't know exactly how long it will take to put his - their - plan into motion, how long it will take for the Dark Ones to utterly consume and spit out this godforsaken place but he hopes to have a few more visits to the hospital before then. 

“I might even take your heart once,” he adds, almost as an afterthought, tapping his cheek in contemplation.

(Hook isn’t going to do that. He will not _own_ anyone in such a manner, not even a pathetic creature like this.)

“Emma will stop you. She's stopped far worse than _you_ in the past.”

“Maybe,” Hook replied, giving a careless shrug. “Then again maybe not. She does have feelings for me after all and you aren’t exactly Mr Popular around here. But maybe she will defeat me sooner or later. I wonder how much I will take from you before that time? What was it you once said to me? Good luck living long enough to see it through.” 

Feeling his point has been well and truly made, Hook strides towards the door, a single hand gesture all it takes to unlock it once more. It springs open, Whale almost falling through it from where he had been apparently been trying to force his way in. 

Hook hadn’t even heard him and he has no desire to have to deal with yet another moron, to argue and state his case yet again. Hook doesn’t even want someone to see how he has healed the Crocodile, not yet anyway. He lashes out with a wild punch that meets only air. There is enough magical force within it to still send Dr. Whale flying through the corridor and crashing into one of the gurneys parked there, tumbling to the floor, gurney smashing upside down on him. That had to hurt. The doctor, a patient in his own hospital. How droll.

\--

He retreats to the Jolly for some peace and quiet.

Sooner or later, Regina will break the magic encasing his ship as well, in her foolish quest to find Robin. He can feel her now and then, feel the magic she pushes against his own. So she has recovered from her tumble at the farmhouse and as he has come to realise about this town, she has most certainly not learnt any sort of lesson when it comes to facing him. Eventually, Regina will snap the magic here too and she will storm the decks looking for the man. It is a futile quest but he has to admit, if only to himself - and the darkness - that he is almost... impressed by her tenacity. 

He finds himself strengthening the magic that protects his ship, despite the fact that it will only make it a more tempting target. He knows this and yet he cannot, in the balance, let his beloved Jolly remain unprotected. 

It hurts to add layers of magic, the effort draining in a way it has never been before. He has to push, to really force the magic out of him, the energy burning and scorching his nerves as it does. There has been so much magic in the past few days, so much teleporting, fighting, wards. Fixing a limb back to a body. It has all come with a cost, draining him dry. He needs to rest. 

There is time to rest, Hook almost staggering as he makes his way inside and down, to the captain’s quarters. Everything is just how he left it, something comforting in the familiar as he makes his way inside, grabbing the chair by the desk and pulling it towards the window. Hook closes his eyes as he slouches down into the chair, leans backing so it almost balances on its back two legs. He breathes in through his nose and out through his mouth, deep, calming breaths. 

“I’ve been thinking... well, you’ve been thinking and I’m here to clear it up.” 

The voice is unwelcome, intruding on this moment and ruining the calm he has worked so hard to build. Reluctantly, he opens his eyes once more, squinting across the room to where the demon is standing in all its crocodile glory.

“Do you really have to look like that while you talk?” Hook lifts a hand to wave vaguely in the direction of the demon, nose wrinkling in distaste at the view. “I know you can be other Dark Ones and it is hard to listen to you when I just want to kill you.”

The gold scaled vision stares back at him for a few long seconds, not blinking. Hook stares back, refusing to break eye contact, to be the one who backs down first. His right eye feels like it's twitching, dancing the longer they stare but he will not blink fully, he will not give in. Not again.

Amazingly, it is the darkness that looks away first.

It turns from him, a ripple of magic shifting out, warping his internal reality and hair and skin, clothes and shoes all change. In a matter of seconds, the old form is gone, completely replaced by a different Dark One.

Where once there had stood a Crocodile, there was now a copy of Emma Swan, in all her terrible glory. Her hair is pulled in a tight bun, every inch of her dripping in black leather, the only hint of colour the bright red of her lips and nails. It truly is a sight to behold.

He sighs, forcing himself to draw out the sound, to exaggerate it and act as though he is unaffected by the view, to finally break eye contact and stare in apparent boredom across the room. Voice is low, deliberately devoid of any passion.

“I suppose I should have expected that.”

The demon smirks, a knowing glint in its eyes as it stalks towards him, making sure to sway its hips temptingly as it moves. Although as a copy, it is subpar to the real thing, he still feels himself reacting to the sight. It's still a part of Emma after all. Hook takes a deep breath as it slides coyly between his legs, automatically spreading them to give her - it - space. It is imaginary, it takes up no space and yet he cannot help but treat it as a physical being. 

He smiles up at her - it. Smiles his best Captain smile, the one that makes countless bar wenches weak at the knees. The one that even Swan isn't immune to. He lifts an eyebrow artfully, all too aware of his own good looks and how to use them. He can fight fire with fire if he has to. The tiny voice can’t help voicing the stupidity of this. To flirt with himself. Hook ignores it. He is good at ignoring things. The false Emma leans close, voice sickly sweet. 

“It’s about Henry.”

“Henry?” He tenses slightly, unable to help the automatic reaction, a second of fear before he makes himself relax once more. From the amused look the Emma demon was giving him, his slip up hadn’t gone unnoticed. Another weakness for it to prey upon. He clears his throat, turning his head to gaze away, out the window and across the bay. He cannot show yet more weakness, cannot let his feeble heart get the better of him and yet. And yet. 

Despite it all, he can’t help the way his jaw spasms slightly as he clenches it. Henry. Baelfire’s boy. Milah’s grandson. 

(He doesn’t want to hurt the lad. He knows he is going to.)

“What about the lad?” Hook manages after what feels like forever. The Emma winks, something cheeky and knowing, only too aware of how he is feeling. It is in his head, it is impossible to fool the darkness. 

(Or is it?)

“He does have potential you know. Imagine the Author working with us Hook, think of the power he wields and how much better it could be if turned towards our purposes.” 

He can imagine it.

He can imagine it only too well.

“Don’t kill him when you take the rest of the family.”

“Right.” Hook gives a snort, shaking his head slightly to break the spell it wants to weave upon him and he had thought the darkness to be smarter than this. “I’m sure the lad will welcome a partnership with me with open arms after I kill off his whole family. Sorry love, I’m evil, not delusional.”

(He is talking to an imaginary person, delusional is up for debate. Evil is not.)

Bright red lips curl into a wicked smirk, a slash of blood against snow white skin. It is captivating for all the wrong reasons, that smile and Hook finds himself leaning forward a little, drawn by the siren in front of him despite himself.

“A minor inconvenience only. Tell me Hook, have you heard of the Curse of the Empty Hearted?”

\--

The blood on the sword has dried by now. It mingles with his, the blood of an old Dark One mixing with a Dark One. The blood of a man who has been to hell and back, mixing with the blood of a once mortal who has lived far beyond his allotted time. There is power in both their bloodlines. The darkness finds it amusing to think that there has been power in his own blood long before it had added it owns particular spin to it. It would have needed his blood regardless of whoever had been convinced to agree to its terms.

_Destiny Hook. It was destiny that led you to us, destiny that decided you and he would be the links to our resurrection. You were born for this. Born to end it all._

There are moments when he is nothing but the darkness whispering in him, he has no thoughts but its thoughts, no wishes, no plans but its plans. In those moments Hook cannot help but believe the lies. He has always been heading down this path, always walking towards meeting this dark end. His whole life, even meeting Swan, even feeling something for Swan, had all been a part of evil’s plan. He is nothing but a pawn.

Now he has the blood the ritual demands, all under the cover of simply getting his revenge.

(Revenge is never simple.)

All according to plan. 

The darkness has been waiting so long for this moment. It can be patient, it has learnt how in the passing of eons. But now, now it is so closer, closer than it has ever been. All Dark Ones are complex - all are simple. All desire things and are used in return. Hook is special though. It never ceases to remind him, that he is special. There are moments, blinks between the black, when Hook finds himself thinking that he doesn’t want to be special - not like this anyway. Those moments are rare though, thoughts instantly rubbed away as the waves roll back in. 

He can feel excitement bubbling up in him, utterly alien and foreign. This is the darkness excited. It releases a shot of adrenaline into his blood, Hook gasping a little as the rush of feeling came over him. 

Everything will be alright now. The crocodile has been maimed and then healed, with the promise of more to come. Let him tremble and shake with anticipation, with the nervous knowledge that Hook will take more. He has tasted Hook’s fire and fury. A hand for a hand. Everything is happening in the way it is supposed to happen. So what if he wants more? If he dares to dream for more. More revenge. 

_Your revenge is done._

(Revenge is never done.)

He wants more than this shadowy figure he has become. More than the wisps of a demon and the nothingness that he will be filled with once he knows for sure the crocodile has passed. 

_Don’t fight it any longer Hook. You’ve come so far already, don’t be a coward now! Play the man one final time. We are so close, you and I._

(Revenge is never... right.)

_Almost there Hook. But first, we must take care of those that would deny you your revenge, your rest._

\--

He had thought it had hurt before. He had assumed that he must have gone insane over the course of his long life, that one of the many mental body blows he had been forced to endure had become to much and his mind had snapped. If nothing else, Hook had assumed the pain from becoming a Dark One, the pain of being forced to relive every breath of Milah’s death, having to witness all his agony over the years would have been enough to send him reeling into insanity. Or that moment, after facing Regina, when her words had pressed on something tender and unknown in him, made him snarl and growl, demanding answers from Robin and only finding more questions instead. 

Yet again, he had been wrong.

He had been so wrong.

This... this is what going mad felt like. 

Power feels as though it is physically seeping out on him, an inky mass around his limbs, giving him a second shadow that seemed to ebb and flow with every breath he took. It seems to sizzle, a low sound easing across his mind, a background hum that Hook cannot shake. He lifts a hand to watch the black, the way it curls faintly see through black tendrils around his fingers, wrapping itself around his pale skin. It is exploding out of him and Hook doesn’t know how to stop it, how to contain it. He wants to rage and scream and hurt and burn the whole world to the ground.

Every dark thought and impulse he has ever had is rising up in him once more, a blood dimmed tide 

He rages and screams without sound, lashing out at anything and everything in his path. It isn’t just his magic, there is only so much satisfaction that can be gained from attacking with magic. He needs to feel it as feel, to let his hand connect with something, to feel items give way under his touch. Hook even needs the feel of his own skin breaking, of hot blood rolling down his hand and tracing the creases of his palm.

He just needs to _feel_ something.

Time passes in a series of blinks. He is standing in a field one blink, the Crocodile’s shop the next. The counter is pristine in front of him one blink and smashed to pieces by the aid of a now bloody hand and hook. He can hear Robin shouting, the magical barrier he had erected expanding without conscious thought to cover the front of the shop as well, to keep nosy eyes away from his breakdown. The sound of the other man seems distorted somehow, as if he is hearing him underwater, sounds too broken to be able to understand what he might actually be saying. Hook doesn’t know how long he rages, how long he is lost to the blinks but gradually he feels his body slowing, his mind returning to himself.

The shop is in shambles, items smashed and broken beyond repair, a tornado of destruction with him in the eye of the storm. Hook stands there, chest heaving as though he has been running for several miles. Legs are a little shaky and he wonders how long he can simply stand here before they give out on him completely. For the first time in what feels like forever, Hook feels as though he might be able to sleep without magical aid.

_Feeling any better now?_

No

(Wait. Yes. And no.)

That strange little voice he doesn't recognize shouts and shouts, screaming itself hoarse yet again, demanding its moment of his attention, demanding that he listen. He doesn’t know where this strange spark of conscious has come from. It has no purpose he can gather, not beyond annoyance. It has no name to speak of, no reason to even exist at all.

(That little voice in the corner of his mind has a name, one he has grudgingly come to acknowledge as ‘Killian’.)

This is... wrong. Everything he has done up till this point is... wrong. Or so it claims.

This is another way. A harder way true, but another way. A better way. Hook finally lets his whole attention turn to that small voice, lets its accented voice fill his mind with its thoughts and desires. It’s ideas are intriguing, now that he is prepared to give it a chance. Hook smiles, lips pressed tightly together. He looks down at his hand once more, ignoring the many bloodied cuts in favour of focusing on the dark energy that is still seeping from every pore of him.

He breathes in. The black around his hand flickers, shifting in an out of existence. He breathes out. His skin slowly starts to reabsorb the wisps. Each breath brings more and more of the darkness back inside of him, locking it back within his flesh and blood. 

_We... we must stick to the plan Hook._

Is that... fear he hears in the voice from the black? It's laugh is a shade too low, a hint of a shake that is not because of anger. The hiss has a degree of hesitation that is new, a pause between words as it seems to carefully pick its way across the ruined landscape that is his mind. It is afraid.

It is afraid of him. 

It is afraid of what he might have become.

Good.

\--

“Afternoon love.” The words have Zelena whirling around in shock at his sudden greeting, and it amuses Hook, to actually see fear in her normally smug face. Finally someone was reacting as they should be, when faced with an immortal darkness that had sought them out specifically for who knew what purpose. That is what he hungers to see, to feel. To be respected as the terror of the high seas and the monster of the land.

He feels more in control now, the constant splitting apart and reforming of himself having reached - if not an end - then a pause at least. A break in the process where he feels more at ease, more in control. For perhaps the first time since this whole mess started, he feels as though he is in control to a degree. There is even peace within his head, the warring sides of himself worn through by recent events. Hook is almost alone/

He has his plan and finally Hook knows what to do. He knows with a chilling mindset, exactly what he has to do. What he _needs_ to do. 

“So... you’re a Dark One now,” Zelena replies after a couple of moments, trying for bravely. She was doing better than the crocodile, he has to give her that. Not that it would have been hard to be more brave than him. Hook ignores her words as he eyes her carefully, taking in the now slim form. He knows that Emma had said she had sped up the pregnancy. The woman should look like a whale, not a would be goddess. So she’s had the child, possibly even before Emma kidnapped her. It makes things easier. She isn’t his type especially - he doesn’t really have a type. At least, not beyond female, attractive, alive, willing. Zelena has curves in all the right places, her black and green dress leaving very little to the imagination. Hook can see why she would be some people’s type.

(She’s neither a brunette or a blonde. In that respect, she’s exactly his type.) 

“I see you’ve had your little imp. Congratulations. Or should it be commiserations?” The child is of no interest to him but he has to wonder what Zelena thinks of the parasite she carried in her belly for all those months. Perhaps it will have softened her edges, given her a new perspective on life and those she has sought to defeat for so long.

Hook really hopes not. His plan isn’t going to work if Zelena is too soft and gooey at the center. If she is weak, like her sister - even, in the end, like her mother. Her look is still very wicked witch, and perhaps Zelena will live up to the hype.

“Regina took my child. Because of your Saviour taking me. I couldn’t protect her.” Her words are all but spat at him, her anger so clearly bubbling away under the surface, eating away at her. Strange, to think she cares for the child, that she might feel love for it but that only feeds into his own strength. Yes, he can use this. 

He has Robin in his power if she wants him, and he is willing to help her with the child if she so desires. It might not be a royal flush but combined with the idea of hurting Regina, and Hook is pretty sure his is the winning hand. 

“Well, let's see if we can't fix that little problem you have. I thought we could pool our resources so to speak.” Hook keeps his voice light and breezy, as if they were just having a casual conversation and that he didn’t care one way or another how she might react. He doesn’t want to give away how much he needs her to agree to this. No sense in letting her think she could dictate terms on their alliance. 

To her credit, she manages to forget her poorly suppressed fear for a moment, disbelief crossing her features as she stares back at him. 

“You... you were going to kill me and now you want to team up?”

Really, Zelena was taking the planned attempted murder far too seriously. 

If Hook refused to work with everyone who had stabbed him in the back, left him chained atop a beanstalk, planned to kill him, tried to kill him, then he would have a very short list of people he could actually work with.

Yesterday's enemy was today's ally. And tomorrow - well, tomorrow was a whole different day altogether. 

“Ah, that was Swan’s silly little plan, not mine. You could say I was never really feeling it.” He smirks at his own joke, similar yet different to one he had made before. 

“Wait that part of the story is true as well?” Zelena seems surprised by the idea, the fear still not having returned to her eyes. Hook isn’t so sure he likes this new turn of events. Yes, it was helpful for not to be too afraid of him, he doesn’t want her cowering in fear every time he so much as looks at her, but at the same time, this worrying lack of fear might lead to her becoming... arrogant. Losing any sense of respect for him. He will have to be careful and nip anything too independently minded in the bud.

“She took your heart? I didn’t think the bitch had it in her. Although I have to admit, I understand the appeal, I even considered it myself once or twice. I bet you look even more delicious on your knee-” Her voice cuts off, words shifting into a pained gasp as she struggles to suddenly breathe, body bending a little in pain. 

Fingers twitch slightly, tightening their magical grip on her throat and Hook will not have her talk about Swan in that way. He can insult the woman all he pleases but that is his privilege and his alone. Perhaps he doesn’t need Zelena after all. His magic is powerful enough to get by without her, he can cast the ritual on his own just fine. It is the aftermath that she might possibly be useful for, but even then he could take the risk that he could manage on his own. If life had taught him anything, it was how to survive without anyone he could trust watching his back. Zelena deserves to be taught a lesson, even if it means she won’t actually be around after to learn from it.

He could just squeeze. Press and press until pop! 

No more Wicked Witch of the West. 

“Down girl,” Hook orders, eyes narrowing spitefully. “Let’s not talk about such a useless organ anymore shall we?” 

There was no sense in mindlessly wasting a possible resource, no matter how much she insulted Swan. no matter how much he wants to make her hurt. She can still be useful, and he will have to just keep reminding himself of that. Zelena forces herself to stand straight again, head held high as she tries to pass off the near strangulation as nothing, as something she would have been able to just bat away on her own if she had so decided. Hook is going to have to keep a careful eye on her.

His smile is decidedly evil as their gazes meet, Hook recognizing something of himself in the woman, something he can use. The fact that she will undoubtedly be using him back, doesn’t bother him. It’s what their kind does. Her own smirk is just as evil, delighted in this unexpected turn of events. 

“So what do you say love?” Hook leans close as he speaks, his breath hot against her cheek, voice a seductive whisper. Hand lifts to rest ever so gently on her hip, drawing her close, the redhead willingly slipping into his embrace.

“Wanna be wicked?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaand.... let me know if you want one extra chapter or a sequel. See you all soon I hope!


	6. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Author's Notes:** Well I’m a lot more happy with this chapter and how it turned out. We’ve reached a turning point here, I’m sure it will be all happy... after this. Yeah. As always, I hope you enjoy, kudos and comments are lovely if you can, but just you guys reading is heartwarming and I love you guys for just coming along on this ride with me.
> 
>  **CHAPTER WARNING:** Some gore, some violence and most importantly guys - we’re going to the lake this chapter. You all know what that means, and if not, well check the tags. Just remember, it's not permanent.

## 

** Chapter Six **

####  _**I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride; - Pablo Neruda**_

__  
Family drama always promises to wholly engulf the people involved. To turn their focus on sibling rivalry or parent-child fights. To inwardly consume until there was nothing left but the family drama, and the family drama felt like the whole world. Case in point, Zelena Mills. Possibly the greatest example of how badly things can go wrong when you allow family rage to blind you. Jealousy was never a good look, especially when it turns you quite literally green with the envy.

One of the many delicious advantages to the alliance he has managed to forge is all the family drama and antagonistic relationships the wicked witch has with the rest of the town. It will split their focus, server their attention so it no longer rests squarely on him but instead on the pair of them, of what they might both want. 

And if Zelena wants to revel in her new turn of events, then who was Hook to stop her? They had time to kill before night and the full moon. World enough and time. It will distract them as well, which aids Hook’s plans further. He has to admit, he will enjoy the show, the fireworks. He will enjoy someone else hurting Regina - Zelena knows better than to try and attack Swan unless it is in defense. He will not have someone else hurt his Swan, not even a partner in crime. Regina however, she can do as she pleases with her. 

Sister against sister once more. That was how it went with siblings. How it always went. Family was more trouble than it was worth. It was better to sail solo, to be unfettered by emotions of love or hate towards your blood, to not be obligated like that. 

(Liam would be ashamed. Of him. Of his thoughts. And most of all, of his actions.)

“Sister dearest.” There is a fake sweetness to Zelena’s words as she enters the dinner, eyes instantly finding Regina. The low level chatter drops away completely, a frosty silence taking its place. Unseen, Hook enters from the back and finds a spot in the corner to watch the promised fireworks.

They still don't check their surroundings properly, how they have managed to survive this long is a wonder and a mystery. Anyone could have crept into their stronghold. Someone did. 

“Zelena. We don’t have time for you right now,” Regina snapped, lifting a perfectly manicured hand and waving it in the direction of her sister, attempting to dismiss her. Hook smiles a little at the attempt, knowing that it will only anger Zelena further. He really hopes he gets to see some sparks fly. 

“Make time,” she replies, an angry snarl crossing her features, something dangerous in her eyes. “I want my daughter back.”

“Please. You come in here on your own thinking you can make demands like that? She is Robin’s child too in case you forgot.” Regina stands as she speaks, the sound of her chair scraping along

“Oh I didn’t come alone. Have you met my new friend?”

Ah, that was his cue. Hook had been hoping for a longer fight between them before he had to intervene, hopefully some physical combat just for the fun of it but it seemed as if his new partner was incapable of even brawling with her sister without some aid. He steps out of the shadows, the wisps seeming to cling to him for a second longer than was actually possible, darkness wrapped around him like a cloak. 

“Hello your majesty,” Hook drawls, giving her a wink as he sauntered over to the pair of them, pace unhurried. He slots next to Zelena, the redhead turning a little to lean into him, one hand drancing up his chest. He should remove it - painfully, permanently. It implies ownership, implies a claim that Hook is not willing to have over him.

The darkness merely chuckles in his mind. Zelena amuses it, in the same way a small ant or bug amuses. It finds amusement in the way she toils and pushes, trying to climb her own mountain, unaware of how tiny the hill actually is and how easily she could be swatted aside without a second thought.

Briefly, he toys with the idea of telling her just how unimportant the darkness finds her. Not yet. She still has her role to play, one she may refuse out of spite if she realises the truth.

(Caught from a different angle, another role is reflected in the mirror, something wrapped in mist and shadow, something he cannot yet put into words.)

“Don’t stop your little catfight on my account. Don’t be afraid to really... get into it,” he tells them instead, glancing around the room as he speaks. Eye catches that of Snow, Hook making sure to give her a teasing wink, receiving a scowl in response.

There is no sign of Swan. Hook cannot tell if that is a good or bad thing. Some part of him is a little disappointed that she is missing out on his moment but at least he won't have to worry about fighting her right now, the only one who could cause him to even break a sweat. The only reason he is able to walk over this town so easily is she can't bring herself to fight him.

(Another part is strangely relieved she won't see him cosying up to Zelena.)

“You got your hands on the sword?” Hook can count the number of times he has seen Regina genuinely shocked on his one hand, and this adds to the tiny total. 

“She isn't controlling me,” Hook tells her, amused by the idea - less amused by the implicit comparison drawn between him and the Crocodile. This is not the first time Zelena and a Dark One have worked together, although that time it has been the witch who had held the very clear upper hand. She had held a tiger by the toe, and arrogant enough to think she would never be held account - the darkness remembers. It remembers it all and waits.

An innocent babe had been caught up in that situation too. Is Zelena’s child an innocent? Or do the sins of the parent truly pass down to the next generation? It would explain - excuse - so many things about him. Hook doesn't think he deserves such an excuse.

He really doesn’t need the witch getting any sort of ideas above her station. Does Regina know the sword no longer controls him? For that matter, does Zelena? It can still kill him and Hook is far from done, far from ready to lay down his burden no matter how much he might desire to. With a loud sigh, he speaks, drawing the attention of everyone back to the matter at hand.

“We want the child Regina. You can give Zelena her daughter or we take it.”

“Her.” 

Hook cannot help but roll his eyes at Regina, and he hadn’t thought her the type to get so focused on the tiny things, to care how he was referring to the still unnamed child - as far as he knew, it was still unnamed, and he had kidnapped Robin before the child was even born. That reminds him, he should probably get around to letting Robin know he was a father again.

Still surely the more important thing she should be focused on is the fact they are going to take the baby if they can?

(Later, he will realise she is trying to buy precious seconds, moments for Zelena to actually think about the partnership she had agreed to. Later he will realise she is trying to save her sister in her own way, to make her see how little Hook actually cares about Zelena and her child. Later, he will be almost impressed by her efforts.)

“Fine, whatever. Her. Give us the child, you know you can’t win.”

“You’re even more insane than I thought you were if you think for one second we are going to give you anything, let alone a baby!” 

Regina places her hands on her hips, lips pressed tightly together. Behind her, Snow and David step up to flank her, offering their support. They are all coming together as a team, banding together in the fact of this new threat. He’d be proud if he wasn’t so damn frustrated at the slow speed in which they seemed to be doing it. 

“Come along love.” Hook’s words are a clear order, a command to bring Zelena back to heel. She looks shocked by his words, by the idea that he might be backing down from this challenge. He can see the hesitation in her eyes, the way she bites down on whatever retort she wishes to make, the way she actually listens to his order. It’s a heady rush, having someone with power do as you bid. It’s the kind of thing he could get all too used to.

“Let them have their moment,” he tells her, self satisfied smirk still on his lips as he looks away to meet the gaze of his one time allies instead. “We will have your daughter soon enough. It will only make our victory all the sweeter. Almost out of time, you kings and queens. The kingdom is about to fall, will you fall with it?” Hook clicks his fingers before they can come up with any witty remark or threat, teleporting himself and Zelena out of the diner. 

He feels he has made his point by showing off his newest toy. 

\--

Zelena paces backwards and forwards, prowling around the ruined remains of the front of the shop like some angry beast. He’s somewhat surprised she isn’t literally growling at him as she moves, almost shaking with contained rage. Her heel grinds down on a broken shard of... something, some remnant of his little breakdown. Had it really only happened yesterday? It feels like an age since he had destroyed the shop in a fit of temper, an age since this new plan had formed and come into being. It had been less than a day. Less than twenty four hours to reshape the destinies of everyone in this pathetic dung heap of a town. 

Belatedly, Hook realises he should probably clean this mess up. His secret lair is becoming less secret by the moment, and he can’t afford the heroes to come bursting in here, with everything he has stored here. 

“They are all heading to the hospital now!” Zelena finally speaks, eyes flashing with thinly concealed rage. 

“Aye,” Hook replies cautiously, unsure where this sudden surge of anger has come from. He is finding he dislikes not knowing things, dislikes the weakness it forces upon him. He also finds he dislikes her angry, dislikes the way in which anger overcome fear. She forgets in those moments, who she was talking to, or rather what she was talking to.

“That was the plan after all witch. Distract them enough so we can cast the spell in peace. We don’t even know for sure if the babe is in the hospital, they are probably hoping to distract us in turn.” Hook didn’t believe the baby is there, it is far too simple, the whole thing stinks of a trap. Or perhaps it was simply he hoped it wasn’t there. His former allies have hardly shown themselves to be shining beacons when it came to opposing him, and in this minor thing at least, he hopes they can get their act together. He tells himself it's just to make the eventual victory that much more satisfying, nothing more. He doesn’t want an actual threat, he doesn’t want them to cause problems, but simply be more than the minor irritants he is currently swatting aside without thought. 

(Hook doesn’t even know who he is lying to at this point.)

Zelena continues to look unconvinced, Hook biting down the sigh of frustration that wants to escape. This woman was becoming more trouble than she was worth. All he really needs right now is some little minion who can follow his orders without question. 

Maybe he should have recruited Mr Smee instead. There is still time to change minion. 

No, his plans won’t work if he uses his cowardly first mate. The man has no magic to start with, no power.

I don't want them bursting in at the dramatic moment to ruin the ritual as they have the annoying habit of doing so.” Nose wrinkles as he speaks, Hook only too aware of all the times the Heroes had burst in to ruin an innocent villains evil plans - he had been one of them after all, casually wrecking someone’s hard work without a moment's thought. 

“You used me!” Zelena sounds honestly shocked by his actions, as though she hadn’t expected him to be so... well, so devious. So evil, and wasn’t that the point? Hook merely raised an eyebrow at her, leaning casually against the wall near the back.

“Of course I did. I needed them distracted, you needed more power to not only take your child, but keep her. Stealing her away is the easy part love, but getting to where you want to go? That is going to take more than you alone.” He shifted ever so slightly, getting into a more comfortable, relaxed position, legs crossing at the ankles. “Don’t worry love. Once the Dark Ones have been summoned there will be nothing in our way, your sister will be powerless against our combined might. You will get the child after, not before. As we agreed.” 

They had shook hands on it, and surely Zelena must know the power in that motion. He is bound by his words, by the deal - so long as she follows through on her end, then he will have to help her retrieve the baby and get her safe. 

(Unless somethings happens to her beforehand, and he is unable to follow through and honour his side of the agreement. Through no fault of his own. After all, everyone knew the truth about his kind.

Dark Ones lie, Dark Ones trick.)

“Then give me Robin now. A gift of good faith because right now all you’ve done is made it harder for me! I would have been better going it alone, I could have taken my girl while everyone else was distracted by you!” As much as it pains him to admit it, Hook has to admit, she has a point. It would have been easier for her to work alone for the first stage at least. They both know that, and he knows he should give her a taste of everything he is offering, keep her sweet and on his side. 

He finds himself hesitating, and Hook can't say why exactly. Giving her Robin hadn’t been implicit in the deal they had made, merely implied but that had been one of the things he had used to tempt her with. He could give her Robin. Maybe he should. Nothing is stopping him from doing that, and Robin in Zelena’s power would surely throw Regina even further off her game. He should give her the other man.

The voice - _Killian_ \- screams in his mind at that, louder than ever before. 

Memories slam into him, almost as a physical blow. Memories of the last night with his father - the last night he had known what it had been to be innocent, although you never know until it is roughly torn away from you. Memories of being sold by the one person he should have been able to trust. Memories of being a slave, of being tied to another person, wholly dependent on their whims and passing fancies. Memories of making the same mistakes as an adult, of hurting someone he had claimed to love by committing that crime against them. Memories of vowing never again, never to open his heart to another - so easily broken - and never to be as his father had been and condemn another soul in such a manner - will he break that vow as well?

He feels sick. 

The child is different. The child is still partly Zelena’s, no matter the vile manner in which it was created. She still has a stake in its existence. Robin though. Robin is not hers, not bound to her by blood or any natural tie. If he gives her Robin, he will be giving her Baelfire, he will be his father swapping both his sons for a boat and few extra days of freedom. 

“You can’t have Robin love, I’ve changed my mind about that one.” He hears the words coming from his mouth, choice made without any conscious decision. 

He is not his father. 

“What? You... I want him! It will hurt Regina. Let’s make a deal Dark One,” Zelena replied, words taking on a snide tone. She knows the power of deals after all, knows the urge that runs deep in all Dark Ones. To collect deals, to trade promises for trinkets. To add to the endless ledger his kind keep, all the souls they have ensnared and ruined over the countless centuries. She must be very confident to risk a second deal. The urge to agree, to barter away Robin for her soul is almost overwhelming. And yet still... 

He is _**not**_ his father.

“I’m not _selling_ you anyone.” Even Zelena seems able to pick up on the change in tone, the barely suppressed rage that lurks below the surface. This is a wound he does not want picked open, one neither of them would survive. He closes his eyes for a moment, trying to will away the headache that is forming there, trying to recapture some sense of calm and purpose. It is almost over. Finally, everything is almost over. He just has to hold on a little longer, has to stomach this just a little longer. Blue eyes slowly open once more, meeting her gaze head on. 

“Finish preparing for the ritual love,” Hook tells her, voice deceptively soft. “After tonight, we will both have everything we want.”

\--

Hook cannot help but think Zelena is trying to prove a point of some kind. He just isn't sure what the point is exactly, or who she thinks she needs to prove it too. Not that he really cares. She could be trying to prove a point to the Cricket for all that it mattered. So long as she behaves when the time is right, then he doesn’t care what she is trying to shout to the world. Her worth will be proved under the light of the moon and no sooner. 

(He knows only too well, what it feels like to be constantly trying to prove yourself.)

For now however, he can indulge her whims. It even amuses him a little to do so.

The sun is starting to set. The last sunlight that will fall on this town, even if they are unaware of the end that is rapidly approaching. Hook feels restless, energy all pent up inside yearning to break free. The darkness whispers as it always does, pressing for action, more action. Perhaps he could go rain down some fire and brimstone on part of the town, just a little foretaste of the hell that is to come. He hasn’t let it out to play in hours and it has grown greedy under his care. 

At the same time though, he knows he cannot let it run wild. It knows it cannot play as it desires. All this energy, all this power, he has to save it for the night, for the ritual which will demand so much from him. It still leaves him restless, an itch across his skin begging to be scratched. Pinpricks of heat traveling across his body offer him no escape, and he cannot simply sit still and wait for time to pass. He needs to do - something. So overpowering is the urge, so demanding the energy burning in him, that when Zelena suggests they take a stroll through the town in defiance of the heroes, he agrees without so much as a snarky comment. 

A walk is hardly the solution he wants to this build up, but he knows the witch well enough to know that she doesn’t mean simply a walk. Some form of entertainment is bound to be had in whatever she has planned. And if she wants to waste and burn up some of her magic before the ritual, then so much the better. She is still trying to prove something, a something that is beyond him, as they casually stroll along the main road, Zelena pressed up against his side for warmth. If she was this cold, he doesn’t understand why she just didn’t conjure up her thick coat for the added protection. It wasn’t even that cold. He doesn’t say a word though, if the woman wants to suffer, then who is he to argue? It would imply he cared. So he lets her stay almost curled up against his long leather coat as they walk, her head occasionally resting against his shoulder. 

Which is how Emma finds them.

He watches, somewhat bemused as Emma’s hand pushes out, her magic tearing the wicked witch away from his side and flying across the road. Zelena shrieks in rage as she collides against brick work, a moment of scrambling for purchase before she is upright again. A bolt of green energy crackles and sizzles past him, directed right at Emma who deflects it with ease. The time taken to bounce it harmlessly away is all Zelena needs to get back onto the street, tossing another curse in Swan’s direction, the pair exchanging magical blows but not quite managing to hit each other. 

If he didn’t know better, he would think the pair are fighting over him.

His ego is healthy, but it is not that large, no matter how he might chose to remember this later. Zelena is fighting for the power he offers her, for everything she will gain by using him, nothing more. Emma is fighting... well, Hook is not completely sure what she is fighting for. He doesn’t doubt it is the darkness inside of her that is willing her on right now, taunting her with the image of the two of them walking. Still, surely it cannot be jealousy, nothing so human, so petty.

Zelena screams as pale fingers wrap around her hair, pulling it viciously, tearing out a handful of red from the scalp. Emma jumps back from her, a snarl on her features that is almost giddy with some strange dark delight as she makes a show of uncurling her fist and letting the clumps of hair drift down to the pavement. 

Okay. Perhaps it is jealousy. 

Emma lashes out again, a harsh clap of her hands against each other that seem to echo unnaturally, a boom like thunder. Her magic rolls along in a wave, engulfing Zelena despite the witch’s frantic efforts to ward it off. Hook grits his teeth as he watches the magic claim his minion and as much as he is - enjoying this? Excited by this? Confused by this? (Aroused by this?) - he cannot let her send Zelena away when he still has a use for her. He reaches out, touching Emma’s magic with his own. Not enough to dispel the magic, or counter it in any meaningful way. He doesn't want to fight her over Zelena of all things. But he can't afford to lose the witch completely and so he brushes the spell, a gentle push to just alter the trajectory, to transport her towards the docks and so within easy reach.

Zelena is going to owe him for this. Wasting precious energy so she isn’t teleported to the void or some other unpleasant place. He will add it to her account for the final reckoning between them. 

\--

It is just the two of them now, facing down each other on the main street. As it should be. It started with the pair of them alone, it is only right that the end begins the same way. Slowly, Emma starts to pace towards him, her movements that of an agile predator. She crosses the distance between them without a word, a finality in her steps that makes Hook swallow heavily. He rests his hand on his belt as he waits for her to reach him, radiating calm he certainly doesn’t feel. This really is the start of the end. He has been preparing for this moment since he first ‘woke’ up, since the memories had returned to him but as he stands here, Hook realises he isn’t ready for the end of his world. 

There is a level of unpredictability about this moment. She could do anything, could actually genuinely try and stop him. She could stop him and then how will the world burn around them?

(He is scared of this ending. Of the bloody story he knows has to be written across the pages of their skin. He is scared but he presses ahead regardless, because the other story is far worse, the other choices they could make will etch into them more than even they could take.)

It could all go so horribly wrong. In a way, that was part of the fun. He sees the danger in her eyes - true danger, true anger, all directed at him - a split second before she speaks. 

“I won’t let you hurt my family.”

Emma grabs for the space in front of his face, fingers already twisting and tugging at the invisible knot that is connected to his consciousness, the key to sending him to the ground. This old trick again. His hand is faster, cutting off the motion before she can complete it, an invisible wall slamming up between them, blocking her magic, stopping the attempt in its tracks.

“Ah, ah, ah,” Hook cautions, making a clicking noise of disapproval with his tongue. 

“Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me dozens of times... no Swan, that trick won't work anymore, I saw you do it too often.” Insulting really, to think that she could just knock him out after doing it so many times. Wasn't that her response to everything though, to try and deny it, to just block it. He cannot help but wonder what she would have done if she had been able to render him unconscious - wipe all the memories and start again perhaps?

How many times would she be willing to send them on this magical tour before she realises that he beyond saving? He was doomed at the start of this, and no matter how many retries she might possess, Swan can't fix this. For that matter, how can he be sure this is the first time he has broken free of the chains wrapped around him?

Oblivion and repetition, a true curse far worse even than the darkness. To replay these roles for all of eternity. It's what Regina had done to them for twenty eight years. Both he and Swan had been spared that, but to be on the outside looking in should have made them more aware of the pain it causes and yet he knows what was still her plan. To doom them all by degrees.

No, this is the first time they have danced this dance. He hopes. It will be the last time regardless. A few more hours and everything will be over. He just has to take care of Swan first, the woman gritting her teeth together as she tries to work out what to do now her original plan to put him to sleep has failed. For an agonizingly long second, she stares at him. Stares into him and Hook wonders what she sees when she looks so deeply into his soul. How many of the flaws and scars that litter his mental mindscape are on offer? How many pulsating sores just below the surface can she see? Why doesn't she shudder and turn away in disgust?

(It is exhausting, to hate yourself as much as Hook hates himself.)

Lips part slightly, a soft exhale as Emma does finally turn away. She spins sharply on her heel, black leather coat flying around her, the harsh movement like a knife across his skin. Hook does disgust her, he knew it. He’s always known it. Disgust that makes her recoil instead of crushing him. Even now, it seems, she cannot bring herself to fight him. Perhaps she simply needs more motivation, needs her family in danger in front of her to actually push her into being a good Dark One. The voices in his head giggle at that, painting a picture of what they could do. Take Henry as they wish, take him first. Make her come crawling to him, ignite that fire in her eyes and Hook has always loved that fire. He has let it burn him on more than one occasion, let it consume him and this is the reward they both got for that. It’s tempting. But no. He doesn't want her to fight him. Hook doesn't even want to fight her and that is surely more important, no matter what the darkness hisses. 

“Emma?” Hook puts a hint of desperation in his tone, the tiniest break in his voice. It takes all of Hook’s self control to bite down the hint of a smile that wants to break free as she pauses, slowly turning to look at him once more. He can be a good actor when he needs to be. Emma has seen through his mask before of course but that was before he knew her, before he understood what would be required to fool her. In a way, he even has the Crocodile to thank for teaching him.

After all, he has been able to fool her for so long when he had to, both times he was heartless. This, should be a cakewalk compared to that, when he had been so concerned with protecting her over what he wanted, over his own desires. 

(He is protecting her now, even if neither of them realise it.)

It still makes his soul want to cry out in agony, knowing that he had been able to fool her, that she doesn't seem to know him. She couldn't tell him apart from a heartless puppet dancing to the whims of another. She couldn’t tell his kisses were wrong, his words were wrong, he was all wrong. Instead, he had been able to lie to her so easily, to coax her into believing him. It was all about what wasn't said, the space between words. Her special power could pick up when someone was lying, but not the omissions. He isn’t lying when he lets the pain seep into his voice, isn’t lying when he implies he needs her not to leave him. The truth shines out far brighter than the hints of lies that darken the edges of him.

As he had hoped, her name makes her pause. There is a moment when she simply stands there with her back to him, but he can still feel the war raging within her, the way she seems to battle with herself before slowly turning back to look at him. 

All the agony he is feeling, the confusion, the doubts, he lets it all appear on his face. Lets it break him a little. Some part of him almost finds release in the moment, feels some of the more intense negative emotions break apart in the choppy waters of his mind. After everything Hook has done in the recent past, everyone he has hurt, it feels only fair that Emma see he is hurting too. Good Form even, for her to know that he hasn’t been unaffected by the storms of his own making.

(Gods above and below, he had hurt _Henry_.)

“Emma,” he repeats, seemingly unable to say anything else. All his thoughts, his plans hover in his mind and yet Hook can’t seem to latch onto any of them, can’t put any of them into practise because he is hurting and oh. Oh. Hook wants to scream, wants to cry because he is hurting so badly and nothing can ease the burns. Everything he is doing just makes them worse and yet all Hook can do is press on further, letting the wounds grow deeper and deeper. Emma reaches out and he lets her, breath catching in his throat at the feel of her fingers on his face. Her skin is cool against his own, a soothing balm that he knows - he _knows_ \- could become so much more if only he lets it. The darkness hisses and spits in his mind, hurling curses and warnings, shrikes that he cannot let this happen. 

He should pull away. Shrug on his dark persona once more. Let the darkness that is swirling around them both take him again. All he can do however is stare helplessly into her eyes.

“Please Killian. Hook. Whoever you are in your head right now, I know you are still the man I love. The one who loves me. I was... I was wrong before, to try and force you into being something else, something I picked over what you wanted.” She draws in a deep, shuddering breath eyes closing for a moment, as if oxygen is an issue for her too before she meets his gaze head on once more. Unshed tears shine in her eyes, making the green glow all the brighter. 

“I know you want to be a good man. Show me.”

Hook reaches out, fingers trembling. There is no lie in this moment either, not even the hint of something in the undercurrents. He wants to touch her.

He cannot help but feel tempted in this moment. And in this moment, he actually considers it. 

Considers how perhaps, just perhaps, Emma could help him. She could ease away the Crocodile in his head. He has tasted revenge already, he has made his enemy pay. Perhaps it is enough, to leave Gold with the phantom pains he has left him and the whispered threats of a maybe that will never come. 

He isn’t the man she loved of course, he isn’t even Killian anymore but perhaps that doesn’t matter. Maybe he can pretend, and if he pretends hard enough she might even fall for this shadow he has become. Or he can push himself down and into the little box she wants, can break himself further and climb into a life that isn’t his own until he forgets he is playing a part. 

Hook dismisses the ideas almost as soon as they form in his head, tossing aside the hope they invoked in him as though it was something bitter. 

Emma can’t silence the voices in his head forever. She can’t make it stop hurting and she can’t hold the darkness at bay. Not even a Saviour can save him. 

And so, at the last second, he twists, pulling on that same knot she has reached for time and time again. He doesn’t give her the chance to react, to try and defend herself, he just pulls, tugging her consciousness clean from her body. Legs crumple under her, body dropping even as he lunges forward to catch her, stopping her from hitting the ground completely. 

Is this how he looked? When she took away his choice back in Camelot? So peaceful, as if she hadn’t violated him - and he hadn’t violated her. 

“Sorry love,” Hook apologises, a genuine hint of regret as he holds her carefully in his arms. She will rest peacefully at least, and by the time she wakes up - it will be all over. It is better this way, better she doesn't have to fight him, have to make that final choice. He brushes a strand of hair that has come loose from the tight bun away from her face, marvelling at its softness. In the cold embrace of the darkness, he has almost forgotten what it felt like, to touch without pain or ice. 

Her bedroom appears around them, Hook gently laying her down on the bed. He has slept in this bed so many times thanks to magic. It seems only fair that she rest here, Hook pausing for a moment to watch her sleep, chest gently rising and falling. 

“I can't have you interfering with this next step. It's time to raise hell.”

\--

The moon hangs low in the sky, a sickly yellow orb that illuminates the scene by the lake, washing out the scenery around them. Shadows lengthen by the tree line, the world taking on a wholly different look in the night, as though the lakeside has been transported to some other land. 

This was his world. A realm of shadow and half truths, whispers lurking on the edges of your conscious that you could never quite translate into audible words. 

Everything is calm and quiet. Hopefully, Regina and the rest of the rag tag bunch of heroes are holed up at the hospital still, or hiding the child somewhere else. He has planted enough clues around to make them think he needs Robin’s child for some nefarious purpose, that the baby might be the key to his terrible plans. He even went and recovered Zelena from the hold of the Jolly Roger, unable to resist the eye roll and witty quip at the sight of her trapped. 

If one of them - probably Henry, knowing the lad - finds Emma, then that will add a complication to his plan, but even if he manages to wake her up, there is still no guarantee that she will think to come here. She knows what he really wants, knows what all Dark Ones really want, but at the same time there is a baby to think about.

His Swan is not so far gone that she doesn’t care about the life of a baby - the way in which she had sped up the pregnancy proved that. Should she wake, she will join the rest in guarding an infant he has no intention of collecting tonight, and so she will miss out on all the real fun. 

Everything is going according to plan. 

He stands near the edge of the lake, bloodied sword held loosely in his hand as Zelena moves around the grass behind him, arranging various items needed for the ritual. The magic he is using calls for a lot of blood, more than the dried mix on the blade he holds. It is the key, but the lock still has to be fashioned, pulled into this reality and that requires his blood, collecting it in a jar for the witch to use.

Hook feels a little woozy, pale from the price already demanded and this was only stage one. The wound in his wrist has already healed, and it had taken effort, mental focus to keep the cut from closing up completely in mere seconds. He had needed to focus, to imagine it still open as the blood had dripped slowly - far too painfully slowly - from his arm. Hook deserved the pain and more besides. 

The memory of that pain lingers in him as Zelena finally finishes her work, Hook able to feel the shift in the air around them, the sparks that rub against each other, ignitiging in the air. Fog rolls down from behind him, thick grey clouds that swirl and all but dance across the lake, power building. Mouth opens, Hook feeling himself speak, strange sounds and uttered words. He doesn’t know the language that is flowing from his mouth but that doesn’t seem to matter, because the darkness does. He can feel the power building up behind and in front of him, can feel the pulsing of the magic as it rolls around and around, Hook drawing it towards him. He is the conduite after all. 

It's a wonder the whole town can’t feel it, as though wind is blowing wildly through, stealing everyone’s breath as Hook struggles to get the words out against the primal fury raging. 

A boat suddenly glides out of the thick clouds, silently cutting through the water. It moves without sail or oar, born along by the power of his words and nothing more. As abruptly as the wind had risen, it died down again, vanishing into nothing as the last foreign words spilled out from now trembling lips. The boat of hooded figures glides to a stop in front of him, as silent in this, as in everything else. 

He steps forward boldly, offering his hand to the lead cloaked figure. Masked as well, he notices with an internal smirk. How brave, how bold of the Dark Ones. Slipping free of Hades like thieving rats in the night and scurrying away in a stolen boat and layers of disguise. He hopes they spent the whole trip looking behind them in fear, convinced that the lord of the Underworld was about to grab them and drag them back to the holes they had crawled out of.

Not that Hook speaks such things aloud. His self preservation instinct is still working perfectly fine. 

The leader lifts a hand to remove their mask, unnatural looking skin glinting in the pale light, and now he can see them properly, he recognizes her. 

Nimue. 

It actually worked. Hook blinks a couple of times as a wave of surprise hits him, shock that is not simply his own. Even the darkness feels surprised and he can’t help the internal shudder that runs through him at that realisation. The oldest evil hadn’t expected to actually get this far - it hadn’t really considered it could win. Perhaps he could use that to his advantage. It had worked. He plasters a smile on his face that is only slightly fake as Nimue finally took the offered hand, letting him guide her onto dry land. Ever the Gentleman, right to the end. 

“Welcome to Storybrooke love.”

\--

Nimue closes her eyes for a moment, a visible wave of exhaustion rolling across her. Behind her, the others do the same, breath stuttering in all of them as they stand near the lake. For a second, she seems to fade a little around the edges,becoming almost translucent before she breathes out again, hands curling into fists. It seems to take an effort, but the oldest Dark One becomes solid once more.

Hook’s expression is deliberately neutral as he watches her struggles, letting the darkness whisper inside of him. He had known this was a very real possibility of course, it had known that the ritual wouldn’t be enough to bring them all the way back. It was why he had really needed Zelena here tonight. 

They are still not whole. The Darkness can do much, but even it cannot bring back the dead on its own, no matter how powerful the magics it uses or whose blood it is capable of spilling to create a key for the lock. It can pull shades back, specters of the once was, but nothing more.

For any other creature, such an existence would be a half life at best, drifting through the world as a more visible ghost, able to interact with things, with people, but never able to actually make a difference, to touch or change things. Doomed to observe, nothing else. 

For a Dark One, it is simply an opportunity for more. 

They are not bound by normal rules and laws. What once was can be again for them. They can be made whole. All they need is a little life, a little magical power to flow from some unwitting sap. To charge their batteries, as someone from this world might put it. 

Her eyes find Zelena. 

“A gift, oh Hook, you think of everything.” Nimue all but purrs, smile cold and dangerous. 

Zelena will not be enough for them. She is powerful, and will be a feast but he has summoned all the Dark Ones and one witch, no matter how wicked or powerful, will not be enough. Even when they drain her dry, into nothing more than a husk. Her life just isn’t enough. Good thing this town was practically drowning in magic, be it magic users or people who had spent decades wrapped in one spell or another. They will be able to feed deeply here. 

“What? Hook... you’re betraying me? Now?” Zelena’s tone took on an incredulous tint to it as she spoke, as though she couldn’t quite understand what was happening. Maybe she missed all the warning signs, all the chants. Dark Ones lie. Dark Ones trick. Dark Ones will stab you in the back if you have something they want or need. Dark Ones only ever care about themselves, about what they want. 

Hook merely smiles. He knew Zelena would try and betray him at some point, so it had made sense to betray her first. To start charging up his real allies. It wouldn't be his fault he couldn't live up to the deal they had made, if the others decided to feed on her energy, her life force. 

“Not so fast Dark Ones,” Zelena snarls, and the wicked witch reminds him of some kind of feral cat right now, hissing and snarling at the people around her as they crowd close, all eager for a taste at least, all desperate to feel something, to feel the grass underfoot or the sensation of the breeze on their faces. “You don’t think I would just blindly summon all the Dark Ones from the Underworld without some insurance did you?”

That catches his attention. Despite the fear, the panic in her eyes, there is a hint of something else in her tone. A note of triumph and she has something up her sleeve. 

“I diluted the blood,” Zelena sneers, head held proudly high. “You might have been called back but you are not nearly as strong as you think you are.” 

Nimue lifts a hand to try and magically throttle Zelena, scowl deepening on her face as nothing happens, the truth dawning on them all. She really had watered down the blood and as a result they are even more ghostly, shades that can barely interact with the world. Hook is sure they can still feed, but it will be harder for them to do so now. 

Everyone’s attention is firmly fixed on Zelena, slowly crowding her further and further, pressing in on all sides, trying to overwhelm her by numbers alone since their magic is so weak right now. 

Behind them, Hook pulls out Excalibur. He stares down at the blade, watching how it seems to almost glow in the moonlight. Hook doesn't know what has compelled him to draw his weapon, attention almost wholly on it instead of the scene playing out in front of him. The sound of Zelena’s angry snarls and shouts, the way her own magic can send some of them flying, push them back but not all and never enough for her to actually move. She is delaying them.

She is... distracting them. 

Something unlocks in his mind.

 _Now_ , whispers the voice that calls itself Killian. _Do it now!_

Eyes drift close as Hook breathes evenly, mentally picturing the scene in front of him. He lifts the sword horizontal, up to his face. Excalibur starts to glow, a faint blue light he can somehow see through closed eyelids. Power is flowing through him again but it is different to the darkness that corrodes his soul and sanity. It lacks the acidic touch of the evil. This is Excalibur, free of darkness or desire. Simply the sword itself.

“Hook?” Is it his imagination, or is there a hint of panic in Nimue’s voice? “What are you doing my dear?”

Hook smiles, a slow curl of his lips that promises wickedness, something naughty and devious in it. He doesn’t open his eyes to look at Nimue or any of the Dark Ones. He doesn’t need to, not when he can see it so clearly in his mind's eye. He cannot afford to look, to think of anything but the sword. It’s weight is comforting in his hand, reassuring him and holding the darkness at bay. As though separated by a thick wall, Hook can hear it hissing its filth and lies, but he feels strangely untouched by it all. 

Inside him, the presence that is Killian shimmers and shifts, becoming more solid by the second. 

He can be Killian Jones again. He finds he _wants_ to be Killian Jones once more. All the simple pleasures that he had once enjoyed, all the things that he had considered important - he can have them again. He can stand on the top deck of his beloved Jolly Roger and feel the wind in his hair and the gentle creak as she rides the waves. He can drink rum in Granny’s again, let the feel of it burn down his throat without the need for more. He can teach Henry how to play dice, how to sword fight - a prince might be a good teacher for the correct foot work and how to hold the blade, but a Pirate will teach you how to stay alive. He can try and fight his way back to Emma if he wants, if he can forgive her, if she can forgive him.

Emma. 

She had always believed in him. Right to the end, to that last moment they had spent together, she had wanted him to show her the person she had always believed he was. His smile grows as he answers, words low and direct. 

“Showing her what kind of man I want to be.”

Sword shakes a little, a trembling thing as once more, he pulls. He hears screams, he feels the way it tugs and moves as though someone is fighting him for control of it. Screams cut through the air, harsh and jagged, screams for mercy, for him to please stop. Screams of terror and he’s standing on the deck of his ship watching a town go up in smoke before leaving. He’s hacking his way through Neverland’s jungle, ignoring the cries of his crew. He’s. He’s. He’s standing in a field with his eyes closed.

Throughout it all, Hook keeps his eyes closed, teeth gritted tightly together. The sword is growing heavier and hotter by the second but he keeps hold of it, lets is burn its brand into his skin. He pulls and pulls until Hook cannot even remember what he is doing or why. All he knows is he has to keep pulling, no matter the pain, no matter the effort. He carries on pulling, pushing through the screams until finally -

Silence.

Blessed silence. He opens his eyes and stares at Excalibur. The names have vanished from the sword, along with the ornate design curled along the edges. Everything in fact, has vanished from the weapon, even the silver sheen of the metal. Pure darkness swirls in its place, sucking in the light around it and making the black stand out all the more. His eyes want to skirt around it, tugging away from the void as though the negative space hurt, gaze sliding to stare at his hand instead. That was slightly easier to look at, even though he could still feel the black out of the corner of his eye, making them twitch slightly. Faint tentacles of the inky presence curl up and around his hand, just resting against him.

He breathes in, sword fading away, melting down into his hand, the tendrils of black following, and in a few blinks, the weapon is gone. The boat is gone as well, along with every hooded figure that had been crowded on the grass. Aside from Zelena’s crumpled form a few feet from him, he is alone once more. As if in a daze, he flexes his fingers for a few seconds, idly examining the now unblemished skin. 

“A little ‘Thank You’ wouldn’t go amiss you know,” he remarks lazily, flicking his wrist to pull the fallen witch back up on her feet. She lets out a sound that is somewhere between a scream and a shout, hands lifting to try and pat down her hair into a more manageable state. Even like this, Zelena somehow manages to adopt an overbearing expression, clinging to her tattered dignity as though it was all she had left. 

“Thank you? For what?”

“Oh you’re quite welcome Zelena. And I should have thought it obvious, I just saved your life. Unless you rather I left you to the tender mercies of the Dark Ones?”

“You were the one who was going to.. What... feed me to them? What did you do anyway?” Curiosity was once again getting the better of her. One of these days it was going to lead her into ruin and it is only the fact he is in a good mood - and that she unwittingly helped - that starves off that day for another. 

“I took care of them. You don’t need to know anything more.” She’s a smart enough woman, Hook is sure given the chance she will figure it out, will realise that where there was once many Dark Ones, now there is only one - two. He is all the Dark Ones. He can feel the power inside of him, can feel all the energy and rage and magic. It is different somehow, to the before, when the darkness was whispering its honeyed lies and he was too weak to resist. Somehow, he is in control of himself and the great evil. It is intoxicating, in a wholly new fashion. 

“I knew you would betray me sooner or later Zelena. I was counting on it in fact.”

(He just hadn’t realised he was counting on it until the moment arrived.)

“Run along home little witch. Run and hide, and pray I don't come looking for you.” Hook stretches, letting some of the magic creep back out, whispers and cracks of black lightning. He smiles, all teeth without any humor. Voice deepens, taking on an echo that vibrates around the area as he leans closer to her. 

“ **Run**.”

\--

He conjures a bucket of water with a lazy wave of his hand. A mirror would be better, a mirror would show him only too clearly the changes that have been wrought upon his physical form. He can feel his body shifting and changing around him, ripples of the pure inky blackness spreading across him bit by bit. A gradual change as the price of his magic slowly became apparent. A mirror would show all he wanted to see. A mirror however is the Evil Queens weapon of choice, her power lies in mirrors. All Hook needs is some kind of reflective surface and what better thing to use than water? His old love coming to his aid once again. Slowly, he leans over the bucket, staring down at a face he knows and yet at the same time, seems so alien and strange. 

Eyes are pitch black, unblinking and wide. Skin is several shades paler than before, washing him out and making the black of his hair, coat and now eyes simply stand out all the more. Faint darkened veins are visible against the white of his skin, tracing elaborate patterns as they fed blood across his whole body. He doesn’t need to look closer to know that they are now black instead of merely deep purple or blue. 

Hook - _Killian Captain Killian Hook Jones Weak Pathetic Pirate Killian Useless Captain Killian No Killian_ \- stares down at the reflection, as if he could just stare long enough and all the changes would somehow start to make sense.

(He understands all too well the changes. The physical representations of the evil that now lurks within his body. Under his skin pulsates an endless void, an absence of light. It is only right that warnings scream across his form, letting people know to stay away. He understands all too well the price that is still to be paid, the gradual breakdown of this form as the physical changes will grow in strength. This is merely the start of the end. He understands all too well and ignores it. 

Denial has always come easily to him.)

Hook tilts his head and considers his options now. Except that isn’t quite right. Hook. He does not feel like Hook anymore, the name doesn’t seem to do this version of him justice. Hook was driven by revenge, by wanting the Crocodile to pay. Hook was a bitter, vengeful man who had slowly changed, who had let himself feel other things as strongly as he had felt hate. Hook was a man who had been willing to sail with his mortal enemy for the sake of a boy he didn’t know and a mother he barely did. Hook was a contradiction. 

He is still not Killian. But then again, neither is he Hook. He is not just the Dark One any longer, not with every dark thought, every scrap of dark magic every entity that has claimed that name, burning in his blood. Dark One cannot describe this new entity he has become. Gifted with all this power, all this darkness and yet he is not one. 

He is somehow more and less than the sum of his parts.

The Captain. For now at least, he is The Captain. Whatever that might actually come to mean is still open to debate, this form is new and there are so many possibilities open to him, so many paths he can take. 

The darkness is silent. Finally, The Captain is alone. 

\--

The magic sings to him, a gentle rise and fall of tempo. It is beautiful in its own way, something soulful and sad. A soothing melody that is at odds with the memory of the darkness’ song, the jarring notes and constant claws into his psyche. This is healing, with nothing negative lurking in the background to hurt him. It still astounds him, that he is in control of himself. For how long, he doesn’t know, but for the moment at least, he is gifted with control as well as clarity of purpose. 

It is easy enough to draw up the magic of invisibility around him like a cloak as he moves through the town. The sun has risen and their world hasn’t ended. He doesn’t think they even realise how close it came, how narrowly they have escaped destruction. The Captain has no desire for a fight or confrontation of any kind as he wanders the town, letting his feet lead the way to his eventual goal. Every step feels like a struggle, as though he is wading through water logged sand. Every step is just delaying the inevitable. He knows what he needs to do - The Captain just doesn't want to.

He is tired, he is just so very tired. 

Instead, he puts it off as best he can by wandering the streets, using his powers to pass by unnoticed. To be able to spy on these families, drinking in moments of quiet one final time. Enjoying the peace, a state denied him. The moments he sees are tiny more often than not, but that doesn’t lessen their value. Rather, it increases them. To see moments where David just touches Snow’s shoulder, a simple gesture of support. Moments where Archie pets Pongo on the head. Moments of life carrying on despite the threats against them. They are so much stronger than he had given them credit for, to be capable of living without giving into fear or despair. 

Emma. He needs to find Emma. It was time to face the music so to speak. If the rest of the town can be brave, then so can he. 

To his surprise, she is where he left her, slumbering peacefully on her bed. Not to his surprise, she is no longer alone. As he had expected, Henry has found her. Her son is sat on a chair he must have dragged from downstairs, perched on it as he watches Emma sleep. Henry jumps as he appears in the bedroom, turning to face The Captain. For a moment there is actual anger on his features, rage that he knows only too well he deserves. Henry was the only person aside from Emma to ever believe in him, and this is how he has paid him back. 

“What... what happened to your face?” Henry stammers, for once at a loss for words. At least he can talk again, The Captain stamping down on the flicker of guilt at what he had done to the lad. It wouldn’t change anything now and the boy is whole again, so it seems pointless to linger on such emotions. Especially when it was Hook that had done such a dastardly and unforgivable deed.

(Strange how he does still feel bad.)

The Captain could have used magic to disguise his eyes and face, to hide himself from the piting gaze of the town. It would be child's play but he does not think it would be fair. They deserve to know what he is now, the new ticking time bomb in their midst. All he has to do now is take care of Emma.

“I changed,” he answers simply. From the frown Henry is giving him, he can tell the boy doesn’t consider it answer enough but it will have to do. He doesn’t want to even think about the night that has just passed, and he can’t even begin to put into words what has happened. Henry will see it in practise soon enough after all. 

“Stand aside Henry.” It is spoken as an order but there is an element of fondness in his words, a softer tone that is at odds with his previous actions. 

“What?”

“I'm not going to hurt her lad,” The Captain promises, almost as an afterthought. He cannot help but muse bitterly on how unconvincing that must sound. 

“No,” Henry decides, moving from the chair to stand between him and the woman still slumbering on her bed. He stares up at The Captain with uncertainty, emotions warring in those all too expressive eyes. “I don't trust you Hook. If you want to hurt my mom, you have to go through me.”

Words hurt, as they were no doubt meant to, a cut into his already shredded soul. They sting with added, unintended malice, verbal dreamshade working its way to his heart. He cannot blame the lad of course, not after everything he has seen him do. He had hurt Henry so badly and it is no surprise that he cannot bring himself to take another leap of faith. The heart of the truest believer... didn’t believe in him anymore. 

He really has lost it all. 

For a moment, The Captain considers simply flicking the boy aside, and doing what needed to be done. He already mistrusts him, already expects him to hurt him in order for The Captain to get what he wants. What is one more sin? One more mark against a soul that is already covered in tiny black ticks. It is the easiest and the quickest way to get what he wants. 

No.

He cannot do that. The part of him that is still Killian alone will not do it. He is better than the darkest impulses of his mind.

A new plan is needed then.

“She will wake up on her own lad, her body is merely catching up on all the sleep she didn’t need,” he explains, taking a step back in the hope the distance will let Henry relax a little. “Physically Swan was fine without it, but once she fell asleep, mentally she is trying to catch up. When she wakes, tell her... tell her she and I need to talk.”

Henry nods mutely, lips pressed tightly together as he continues to stand there, a lion’s cub guarding his mother. The Captain gives them one last look before the red of his power teleports him away - he has other, less pressing tasks to complete while he works out what he is going to do with Swan.

\--

Robin is a loose end, just like Regina and Zelena. As is Henry. As is Belle and yes, even Rumplestiltskin. All these people he has played with, hurt, all still dancing upon his whims. He split open the woven tapestry that was their destiny and pulled threads without care or concern. All that had mattered to him was getting a reaction - any reaction really. And then there is Emma - the largest loose end of all. He knows what he has to do to fix that of course, but with Henry ruining his first plan, he will have to come up with some other way to end that. 

Somehow, he has to make this right. Or, at the very least, he has to find a way to sew back up their lives to some sort of normality. He has no idea where to start with Henry, what he can possibly say or do that could even start to repair the broken trust between them. If there is even time enough left, to try and salvage something from the wreckage of what they had been forging. Robin, when the time comes, will be easy enough. All he has to do is complete the contract and let the man go free. Which will also go some way towards easing Regina’s issues. Zelena admittedly is more complicated, her wants contrast greatly with her sisters. The Captain does not consider himself wise enough to mediate between the two - he has no children, his one attempt at raising Baelfire had ended in possibly the worst way imaginable. Despite having power, he does not think he could - should - decide the fate of anyone anymore. Especially a child. 

It is all dancing around the actual issue again. The one he could hurt the most and the one he wants to hurt more than any other. Even like this, hurting Rumplestiltskin is still woven into his own tapestry of life. It might not be the sole driving force behind him any longer, or the burning rage that it had once been, but he still desires to make the monster pay. It sits in the back of his mind, a low level urge that he can easily ignore when he isn’t faced with the means to do so.

The means to hurt Rumplestiltskin is right here now, within his grasp. 

He stares down at Belle, the woman still caught in his stasis spell. She looks so peaceful like this, all traces of care eased away. It would be so easy to reach inside her open mind, to nudge memories and remove all traces of the crocodile. To fabricate a new life for her, spinning a brilliant new tale as easily as her love spun straw into gold. 

He could make her feel better. Take away all that sadness, all the pain and loss that has come with the choices she has made - or had made for her. You never get to choose who you fall in love with, no matter what your head might say, no matter how you might fight it or tell yourself it was wrong.

The heart wants, what the heart wants. 

It would be a kindness in a way, to change her memories. It would still be wrong.

Pure black eyes close, letting the darkness behind his eyelids ground him, give him an anchor point to start from. Gently, The Captain slips into her mind, moving between memories without touching them, trying to leave as few traces of his presence here as he can. Frown creases on his forehead as he feels something different within Belle, something new. Her life burns fiercely within in, a pillar of fire at the core of what she was. But... there was more than just that. Faint vines wrap themselves around it, blooming life that shines, a fainter light than Belle’s own but it is still there. 

The knowledge of what this new light is, eludes him.

(The Captain, Hook and Killian all conspire to ignore the reality of what this thread of life and light burning so brightly inside of Belle, really means. There are limits to his mercy, limits to his sanity. He cannot let himself know the truth, know that the Crocodile is so close to a new level of happiness, the type of happiness that has eluded him. He locks the knowledge deep within himself, buried as deep as he possibly can.)

No matter. It is just another mystery, one he cannot spare time to solve. It does not change anything in the long run. 

He presses on, slipping deeper and deeper into her mind, to her subconscious. Carefully, The Captain sets to work, leaving an imprint in her, a message for after she has woken. It will uncurl slowly in her mind, the last gift he has to give her. He only hopes it will help and that maybe, one day, she will be able to forgive him - maybe on that same day, his shade will even be able to forgive himself. 

\--

Fairy lights are strung out across the deck of the Jolly Roger, powered by magic and nothing more. They snake across the rigging, wrapping around the rails as they go. They give off a gentle glow that lights the area, something unreal and soft. It hopefully gave off a warm look, a place that could be trusted and while the Captain knows only too well how appearances can be deceptive, he honestly wants this to be a safe space. Good memories need to be forged on deck, and his beloved ship needs some attention too. 

The Captain doesn’t know how else to signal he is here and so he waits. Time passes. He waits. He doesn’t know exactly how long he is waiting, watching time tick by. He whispers to the wood as he waits, sweet words of nothing, of comfort that he knows, on some level, the Jolly can understand. Not in the same way humans can, not in a way he could fully explain to anyone else. The pair of them have been together for a very long time, a boy and his ship. She has seen him at his best and she has seen him at his absolute worse. 

His whispers are also pleas for her to forgive him one last time, to understand. To be good to the one he has chosen to replace him, soothing promises that the lad is good, the lad is kind. He understands her almost as well as her Captain does. Henry will make a good new Captain for her, once he finds the note he has left with Belle. His final gifts to the whole town.

The creak of planks tells him someone has arrived, dragging his thoughts back to the here and now. Relief floods through him as he turns to find Emma standing there, a prayer to deities he knows do not listen on his lips that she had come, she had actually come.

“I hoped you would come. He passed on my message then?”

“He did. Henry’s a good boy.” There is a touch of defensiveness to her words, almost as though she expects him to argue the point. She doesn’t ask about the change in his appearance, the pure black eyes - of course she doesn’t, she has the last free darkness in her, it will have felt the shift, the draining of its power as he absorbed them all. Emma knows only too well what he has done. She probably also knows what he is planning to do. He just hopes there is enough of the woman she had once been to let him do it. 

“I’m glad you came,” The Captain says instead, offering his hand to her. She hesitates, eyes flickering to the side as she stares at something beyond his vision, a little flicker betraying the voices in her head. Swan is the last defense the darkness has, the last weapon, the last chance they have of escaping the trap he has set it. He waits again, giving her the time to work through whatever it is saying to her. He needs to show that he trusts her too.

“It is telling me I should be afraid of you. That you are going to try and kill me,” Swan tells him at last and he hates that tiny note of doubt in her voice - doubt he has planted and allowed to take root deep within her. Some part of Emma thinks he is going to try and kill her.

“You know the darkness Swan. The demon lies, if it tells you that, then you should trust me instead. One last time love? One last dance?”

“One last dance,” Swan agrees after a pause that felt like an eternity, stepping forward to let him take her hand. Music starts up around them, invisible musicians playing a gentle tune that weaves around them. It takes him back to a different dance they had shared, when they had pretended to be a prince and princess. What he wouldn’t give to be back there again, to be concerned with such things as making sure her parents met and fell in love, with working out how to get back to their own time. It seems so much simpler in retrospect, the troubles they had faced in that time. The enemies were outside and obvious, it was easy to see who was the villian. 

They spin and come apart in time to the music, stepping away only to be drawn back to each other a few beats of music later. He dips her, Emma easily moving with him, trust in every motion. They spin and sway and in these moments The Captain allows himself to forget everything else. He is still selfish, he still has wants and right now he wants this. One final dance with the woman every version of him has loved in different ways. 

Music comes to a close - too soon, far too soon - notes slowly dying around them but The Captain barely notices. Her eyes are warm, the green of fresh growing plants, something soothing. He can’t help but appreciate the fact she is staring deeply back into his own, as if the inky nothingness of his gaze still captivates instead of disgusts her. 

“Do you want this power?” His question is little more than a hushed whisper, not wanting to break this moment of stillness and calm around them. 

“No. Do you?” 

The Captain cannot bring himself to actually utter the words, simply nodding instead, letting the truth of the action shine out. Hand lifts to her cheek, brushing against warm skin and he marvels at the contact, at what it is like to actually touch another again without the threat or fear of violence. Black eyes dip down for a moment, looking at her lips before they flicker back to meet her gaze. 

He isn’t sure who leans forward first, who takes command. All The Captain really knows is one moment they are staring at each other, still in each others arms from the dance and the next his lips are on hers - or maybe her lips are on his.

They kiss. 

It is slow and sweet, the press of lovers returning to each other after a short absence, a tender caress as they relearn the feel of each other. It lacks the anger or desperation of previous kisses, hand still cupping her cheek, thumb brushing gentle tiny circles against her skin.

Power runs through them as they kiss, a tingling sensation that sweeps from his lips and down his body, filling every limb of him. Somewhere along the way, he has closed his eyes in the kiss, too lost in the taste of Emma. Light starts to build up behind his eyelids, a growing white heat that builds on par with the tingling that is still filling him. For hopefully the final time, the Captain pulls. He drags that sensation into him, he hoards and holds it tight, gripping on for as long as he can. 

Finally, the brightness is too much even for his closed eyes. The light burns, The Captain taking a staggering step backwards and breaking the contact between them. He throws his arm up as he moves, in a bid to shield his eyes from the light, a moment of incandescent power that spreads out across the whole ship. Blinking a little as the light fades, The Captain slowly lowers his arm once more. Breath catches in his throat as he stares at Emma in sheer awe. 

Her hair is spun gold once more. It flows freely down her back, gold standing out brightly against the red of her leather jacket. It is no longer a Dark One who stands before him. 

It is his Swan. 

It is his Saviour. 

She gasps, body arching as for the first time in weeks she takes a breath without the crushing weight of the darkness pressing down on her. For the first time in weeks, she is herself again. 

“I’m not... I’m not the Dark One anymore,” Emma murmurs in wonder, staring down her hands. Head snaps back up a second later, wonder replaced by horror as she takes in the leather clad, black eyed pirate in front of her, apparently untouched by the power of their kiss. 

“Killian...”

With a small shake of his head, he lifts his hand, stopping her words and he doesn’t want to hear her accuse him of betraying her yet again, he doesn’t want to hear the thought turn verbal, the pain and sadness in her voice. 

The Captain hadn’t lied to her. 

He doesn’t want this power. He needs it. Needs it in himself to save her, to save everyone. He needs to swallow it whole and stop it from hurting anyone else ever again. No matter the price. He can’t explain any of that to her though, can’t tell her his plans because she will try and take the hit for him, she will try and save him one last time. Not that she can sacrifice herself anymore but he knows his Swan, and just how bloody stubborn she is. If she knew his plan, she would somehow find a way to stop him and The Captain can’t have that.

“Meet me tonight, by the lake love.”

(One last lie to end their relationship. He won’t be there. He won’t be anywhere by tonight but he wants to save her from the painful truth of that reality for as long as possible.)

\--

Time is running out.

For the darkness mingled with human, it is a strange concept to grasp. It understands the passage of time, understands ages and eons. Understands the need to go from host to host when it eventually becomes too much strain on the body or when it just desires a change. 

The being created by the mix of this soul and the dark is different to all that have come before. There is too much darkness, too much of the night and not enough of the light, of mortality. There is an added urgency here, a timer that is ticking fast as the sands drain away. This body is mortal despite the years it has seen. The power stored within it is too much, despite his continued control. There is just too much power contained within him, too much energy and fire. It is burning him from the inside out, slowly but surely hollowing him. If he doesn’t end this soon, on his terms, then he will be nothing more than a husk, a shambling form for uncontrolled, unintelligent darkness to use.

His heart stops. The Captain can feel it, the erratic beating and then the absence of such. It reminds him of the time Gold had held his heart and squeezed, and he had been unable to do anything but writhe in agony. The pain right now is real, The Captain screwing his eyes shut as he staggers, half falling against a wall. The bricks feel solid against his back, and he clings to that sensation, using the sensation to ground himself as best he can. 

With a grunt, he hits his chest, forcing his heart to beat again with a jolt of magic. It stutters a little, struggling to gain a regular tempo, The Captain feeling it start to fade a number of times. Each time it falters he pushes with his power, keeping it going as it gradually settles back into its normal rhythm. He sighs softly, allowing himself just a second long against the wall. Another sigh escapes him, The Captain pushing himself off the wall, swaying slightly as he did so, the pressure of everything weighing down heavily on him.

No, he will not give in here and now. His heart is beating again. For the moment, everything is working as it should. It won’t be long before another organ gives way under the pressure and he has to force it back to working. He doesn’t know how much longer he can keep this body together. Even he must have a limit. 

Eyes close for a moment, mentally going over the list in his head. Belle will wake soon. He has left the note with her, dividing up his possessions between those he has come to care about. The wounds he has left on his family are still raw and aching, but beyond the final act still to come, he doesn’t know how to heal them. Emma has had the darkness removed from her, that final flicker swirling within him too now. Events are all set in motion and he knows his shadow is stalking him already, the harbinger of his doom. Zelena is not as subtle as she thinks she is, he has caught sight of a flash of red hair a couple of times now as she waits for a chance to strike. 

She seems to have finally worked up the courage then. He needs to get off the streets, away from people who could get caught in the crossfire between them. He will not have her harm any more innocents while she unknowingly fulfils his wishes. There is also one other thing he needs to do before Zelena catches up with him too.

And then The Captain - _Killian_ \- thinks he will finally be ready.

He will be ready to end this, ready to be Killian once more for the brief time he has left. He is ready to lay down his many burdens and rest at long last. 

He is just so tired.

\--

Coat billows behind him, the darkness leaking from him to add length and drama to it as he walks. It is easier to let his powers seep out now and then, to give it some teeth rather than try and hoard it inside of him, to feel it claw at his innards. It is harmless to let it out a little. For now at least. If it helps to make him a target, to make it blindingly obvious where he is just so he knows the witch will follow him.

Bell jingles gently as he pushes the door to Gold’s shop open, the small metal object somehow surviving everything he has done to the shop in the past few days. It tinkles again as the door swings shut behind him, The Captain walking further into the room. He lifts a hand as he goes, shadows dancing over it in response to his subconscious thoughts and whims. He has come to the shop for a specific reason, for a single task. Somehow, despite everything, Regina has yet to find her lover boy, yet to unlock the chains holding him in place. He needs to let Robin go. It is the right thing to do - The Captain has no quarrel with the archer.

There is the other reason as well. He has no desire to take Robin with him, to be the cause of the archers untimely death. 

Still, The Captain is torn.

The deal was Regina had to find Robin in order for him to life the spell binding them both. Find Robin before he grows bored and kills him. He has no intention of fulfilling that part of it of course, he isn’t bored. Regina hasn’t found them yet. There were so many clues, so many hints and he doesn’t understand how she can be this blind. Unless she was so wrapped up in protecting the child, that other issue have fallen out of her mind. 

They hadn't shook hands on it. He hadn’t really given Regina any choice or even hung around to hear her agree to his terms, such as they were. 

But it was still a deal. 

(His deal with Zelena hovers in his mind as well, the child protected by the fact the Dark Ones were never properly summoned to Storybrooke. The irony of her betrayal being the only thing that stops him from being compelled to do his side of the bargain is not lost on The Captain. Somehow, he doubts Zelena would find it as amusing.) 

Black eyes close for a moment as he struggles with himself, with every Dark One’s urge for deal making and bargain keeping. 

He reaches out, and with a wave of his hand and the ebony black blade that is Excalibur appears in his grasp. It’s weight reassures him, grounds him and gives The Captain added strength to continue. He is not the same as any Dark One that has come before, he is not bound by the same rules and desires as them. He will not sacrifice an innocent life to the altar of what this evil had once been.

Deliberately, The Captain places Excalibur down on the countertop, turning away and taking a few paces towards the curtained off area where Robin is being held, so he is standing with his back to both the door and the sword. A second later he lifts a hand to his mouth, mimicking the motion of a lock being unlocked, a tiny twist of his fingers before tossing an invisible key away. The Captain can feel the faint wave of power rushing through him at the motion, power than breaks the bond between himself and the other man. Just in time too it seems, easily able to pick up on the sounds of another person in the shop, someone trying - and failing, although he doesn’t react - to be as stealthy as she possibly could be. 

He is ready for the blow. 

Zelena screams. The blood curdling sound cuts through the air, making even The Captain jump as he spins around to face her, all thoughts of feigning ignorance to her presence forgotten at the sound of such intense pain. 

She staggers backwards, still screaming, clutching her right wrist, hand pulled up to her chest to try and protect it, cradling her blistering hand against herself. His nose wrinkles in disgust as the smell of burning flesh fills the room. He had known the sword was powerful, too powerful for just anyone to wield it, which is why he had made sure Zelena would be the one tempted into doing so. 

“No, no, no!” This wasn’t right. Zelena was supposed to be able to pick up the sword, she was supposed to be able to betray him one last time, just as he had planned. Only a Dark One could wield the sword after all. Who in this town - aside from himself of course - was Dark, if not her?

“Pick it up! **Now**.” The Captain puts force into his words, the demonic echo of his voice betraying the power in it. At any other time he might have enjoyed the way in which she flinched before scurrying forward to do his bidding, compelled by his voice to obey his orders. Not now however, not when he is so close to his goal and Zelena seems determined to ruin it by her own mortal weakness. He just wants to die. Why is the world so against that happening? 

Her fingers barely curl around the handle of the sword before she is screaming again, the fresh scent of new sizzling flesh assaulting his nostrils. She pulls back again, tears streaming down her face at the pain in her hand, voice dropping to pathetic gasping whimpers. 

“Useless, useless, useless. You’re all useless!” She was supposed to kill him to try and take his power, and instead end the threat of the darkness once and for all. Not sob like a weakling because her hand burnt a little at the raw energy Excalibur gave off. With a snarl, The Captain throws her across the room. There is no satisfaction to be gained from the sound of her body colliding painfully with the door, or the noise she makes as the air is pulled roughly from her at the contact. Just satisfaction from the way in which the sobbing stops. 

She is silent and he can think again. Carefully, he crouches, collecting Excalibur from where it lay, fallen on the ground. It doesn’t hurt to hold it.

(It hurts. It’s just hard to seperate that pain into something he can identify, to recognize it over the low level agony that is his every waking, breathing, moment.)

He had hoped... well, he had hoped and that had been foolish of him.

So a dark being is not good enough. A former Dark One perhaps? Gold? He hates Captain Hook enough, he has no doubt the man would relish the chance to stab him but the sword is power made manifest and The Captain does not like to think what could happen if Rumplestiltskin is given the chance to hold such power in his hands. Even the chance of revenge might pale in comparison to the opportunity to be strong once again. If anyone can hear the faint whispers of the darkness, the dying embers of the once was, then it would be the crocodile. The Captain is working hard to stifle those sounds, to throttle away any last traces of the intelligence of the monster that lurks in the dark.

No, he can't trust Gold. 

Shoulders slump as realisation dawns on him. Of course. Not Zelena, not Gold. There is only one person that can hold this sword long enough to end the threat once and for all.

Who else was it going to be in the end, but her?

(Funny to think he hadn't lied to her after all. As though he had known somehow that he would be able to keep his word and meet her by the lake. Perhaps that was why her super power hadn’t gone off when he had spoken. At the time, The Captain had foolishly assumed she had just been distracted by the chance to really pick up on his lie. Now, he knows it wasn’t a lie at all.)

\--

To his surprise, she actually comes to the lake as night falls. More than that, she comes alone. He cannot hear or sense anyone else nearby, as though they are the only two people in the world. The Captain is greatful of this small mercy. It had only occurred to him once he was there, that she might tell the others, that they might insist on coming too. He doesn’t want Henry to witness this. He is grateful, and also horrified, that she would risk herself like this. His Swan is so loved, so cared for and she never sees it. He had hoped against hope that perhaps her time as a Dark One would have taught her that lesson if nothing else. But instead she confounds his expectations and comes alone. 

(He should really stop doubting her one of these days. A lesson he wants to learn, even though it may be too late to do so.)

“One last dance?” Her smile is brittle, a barely there expression as though she is waiting for him to attack or betray her again. It hurts him more than it should. 

“Not quite love.” 

There is near silence after that, the sound of their breathing the only thing he can hear in the night. Such a simple thing and yet The Captain finds himself focusing on it for longer than he really should. The sound of her breathing, the feel of the cool night breeze against his skin, the sensation of just being alive. He will miss this. 

“What are we doing here Killian?” 

“This is a gateway,” he explains, turning away from her to look out across the lake, towards the portal he knows exists even if it cannot be seen by their eyes. It hurts to look at her. To look at something so beautiful, so bright and know that he had a hand in attempting to destroy it completely. It does not matter that he is the one who then saved her, he had first tried to hurt her and that he could not forgive himself for. 

“The walls are thinnest here, between this world and the Underworld. It means the Darkness cannot latch onto another if it is released here. In the correct way of course.”

He hears her sharp intake as he talks and The Captain can almost taste the hope in the air around them, can almost hear her thought process, the joy of the way in which he is talking of banishing the Dark One’s powers for good. She really thought he was planning to keep this power, this inky blackness that was literally leaking from his body. Another wound in his heart and he doesn't know how many more he can take. His own breath is softer, almost nonexistent as he turns, intending to move closer to her. 

Leg refuses to work, to bend as it should in order to keep walking and he feels himself stumble a little as he moves. Jaw grits in frustration at the physical weakness he cannot help but show. 

His body is shutting down faster and faster. It won’t be long now, won’t be long until not even the blackest of black magic in his blood will be able to repair the damage that its presence is causing. He is dying over and over again, and The Captain knows unless he can seal himself away tonight everything he has tried to accomplish will be lost. 

If the darkness escapes his broken down form before the sword can be used, then all the Dark Ones’ power will be free again to roam and ravage as it pleases across this realm. It has learnt from him, learnt the mistakes that enabled him to trap and contain it. He does not think it will allow itself to be caught like this again, it will not run the risk no matter how much it desires to be whole and strong.

He licks his lips, jagged and chapped edges cutting into his tongue as he does. It takes more energy than it should to offer the sword in her direction, black weapon almost hissing as he forces it to move.

“I'm, ah... going to need a little help here.” Asking for help is even harder than angling the sword towards her, blade trembling, suddenly the weight of a thousand Excaliburs trying to drag him down.

It is almost a physical lightbulb going off in her head, the moment his Swan realises why they are both here and what he wants her to do.

“It should be me,” Emma tells him, a slight hiccup in her voice, a hitch and break. “If one of us has to die, it should be me.”

“It doesn't work that way love.”

In that moment, a sense of peace washes over him, a peace he has never known before. This is how it has to be. This is how it was always going to be. It only lasts a moment, but he clings to the memory of it, uses that faith to keep himself going. 

“I saved you love, save me now?” He needs her to save him. He has always believed in her, in her powers, her gifts. He has always supported her. Just once, The Captain needs her to be the Saviour, over the woman he loves, destiny over desire. 

“Let me be Killian again.” he pleads, tears blurring his vision. “Please, let me be Killian.”

“I can’t... I can’t _kill_ you,”

He wants to smile, something small and broken. How can he tell her that he is already dead? Some part of Emma must know that, even if she is unwilling to admit it or face it. Magic is the only thing holding his body together, the dark power constantly healing his wound over and over again. It would repair the skin and tissue below, only for the wound to split back open seconds later. 

He was wrong before. It wasn’t the Crocodile that was playing the role of Prometheus in this retelling of the myth. 

It was him. 

And there was no happy ending for him in the traditional sense. Just an ending. 

“You won’t. You’ll save me. The darkness is using my soul, my everything for kindling Swan. Don’t let me die like this.” He is in control of the darkness, in control of himself once more but he knows it cannot last. Either he dies here and now on his own terms or it will win. 

“Save me one last time love.” 

“Could you?” She asks, words muffled through the sobs that are wracking her body. “Could you do it if... if it was the other way round? Could you stab me?”

“To save you?” He smiles as he speaks, that sense of calm from before washing through him again, a reassuring wave. “I could do anything.”

There is so much that needs to be said between them. So much pain they have caused each other with their words and actions. He does not think he can forgive her completely, even now, for filling him with the darkness but he doesn’t allow those words to be voiced. 

(The Captain, Killian and even Hook, all understand why she did it. They know she loves them, knows she was afraid. Knows it doesn’t change the hurt they feel inside.)

He is not selfish enough to demand a reckoning with Swan in this moment. To add even further to her pain. What he wants to say, what he needs to say, the things that need to be said to fix them cannot be covered in the moments they have left. A yawning chasm stretches out between them still, and there isn’t enough time to rebuild the bridges. No amount of secrets and truths can repair this. This is bigger than the Echo Caves. 

He can smile though. Can let himself finally feel the love burning so fiercely inside his chest, let it overpower any anger or betrayal that might be lurking in his soul still. He has chosen this moment, chosen this action with all the consequences it will bring. He has done this because the love he feels for his Swan, the desire to protect her one last time is stronger than anything else.

“I love you Emma Swan.” It’s something he hasn't said in far too long. 

For last words, they are a damn sight better than he thought he would ever get.

Tears are streaming down her face as she darts forward, pressing a quick and desperate kiss against him. It speaks of goodbye and sorrow, a soul crushingly deep sorrow that no words can properly express. It is over far too soon, The Captain biting down on his lip to swallow the plea that wants to bubble up inside of him, to ask for one more kiss, one more second. 

(He is scared, fear alternating with unnatural calm.)

Emma’s breathing is still uneven as she takes a single step backwards, her anguish written clearly on her face. Normally, she fights so hard to keep everything hidden and locked away inside of her, and some part of him can’t help but feel awed that she lets him see how much this is hurting her. She is letting him into her life, for these last few seconds. Her hand slowly reaches out, touching his own. It feels like an electric current running through him at the contact, something that hums and sings in his blood. 

Smile is shaky but sincere as he nods softly, trying to offer what wordless comfort he can as he silently pleads with himself to be brave. For this final hurdle, please let him be brave. Reluctantly, he pulls his hand away from her, breaking the contact between them. Instantly, he feels cold, a bone achingly chill that sinks deeply through him. It is only fitting that the cold of the grave should take him now, to let him prepare for what is about to happen. 

With a deep breath, he spreads his arms wide, offering himself up to the sword and salvation. 

\--

He thinks for one long, terrible moment, that she won't be able to do it. Both her hands are still tightly wrapped around the hilt of the sword as she stares at him with wide, wounded eyes. It is a lot he is asking for her, he knows that. His Swan is the only one who can do it, the only one who can finally end this once and more. Emma swallows heavily as she lifts the blade, adjusting her stance, and he thinks, once again, how stunning she is. How strong, how brave. It is a cruel thing he needs her to do, it is unfair and he knows this. Such is the way of the world. His role is easy - he only has to die, and die once. Emma will have to live, each and every day and that will be so much harder.

He feels the blade enter - he _feels_ the metal pierce his chest, the give of skin and bone as Excalibur impales him, feels the tiny trembles that run from Emma’s hand and down through the sword, causing faint vibrations that only makes it hurt all the more. He feels his lungs start to fill with his own blood, breathing becoming wet, sickening gasps. Despite everything his body is fighting to stay alive.

He thinks she is beautiful. In this moment, and in every moment. Not despite the tears that running down her face, obscuring her own gaze as she stares into his eyes. Her tears only add to her beauty. Just as her smile adds to it. Everything she has done or could do, only makes him realise how deeply he loves her. He thinks his love for her might have no limit, a knowledge that both terrifies and thrills him in equal measure. 

He feels the cold grass on his knees as he slams heavily down, the world starting to slowly darken around the edges even as his breathing becomes more laboured. Gradually, the whole of his body is starting to feel as cold as the ground he is kneeling on, fingers tingling as the blood drains from his outer extremities in a futile bid to protect itself, to save the blood for more urgant uses. 

He thinks perhaps the scales are finally even. After all this time, after all the debts on his side, all the mistakes and red he has washed his life in, perhaps this final act will cause the Gods to show mercy upon his wretched soul. He thinks truthfully, that he should know better than to hold onto hope. He thinks when he opens his eyes in the afterlife, all the shades of those he has killed will be lined up for their due and it will be no less than he deserves. One good act cannot possibly make up for a lifetime of villainy, no matter how grand the gesture turns out to be.

He feels her heat against him as she drops down to support him, one hand cupping his cheek. Even that heat is faded a little though, as if he is only capable of partly feeling her. It’s nice while it lasts, and he clings to that sensation, the comforting presence of Emma holding him once more. Tears are pouring freely from her eyes, and he wants to say something to try and comfort her. He feels as though she shouldn’t be sad and he doesn’t want to add to her pain. Words refuse to come, and he is unable to do more than make choking little sounds that only serve to upset her further. Her hair smells of strawberries. 

He thinks he might not want to die, just as he knows he has to.

He feels the darkness ebbing from him, faster than his life was fading. That was... wrong. Something was wrong. The darkness is escaping from his trap, being drawn out of him and towards something else, some singing object that beckons it closer. He holds onto it tight, mentally gripping the dark presence as best he can, holding it close against him. Parts are still slipping free, escaping through his fingers like water and sand but he dams the flow as best he can.

He thinks dying is supposed to hurt more. Slow means painful and this has been slow. The sword is still sticking out of him but it has stopped hurting, and he stares down at in an almost bemused fashion. Everything is cold and he wonders if this is what is supposed to be happening right now. He thinks he should be feeling something more than sorrow and regret at leaving Swan. Should he be scared? Angry? Raging against the circumstances that have led to him bleeding out in the arms of the woman he loves? 

He feels her lips press against his own, a featherlight touch of a kiss mingling with the salt of her tears. A weak breath escapes him, an exhale of soft air as he claws for one more second of consciousness, one more moment on this earth, with his love. He feels himself press back against her, lips softening under her own as he kisses his farewell into her, trying to say everything he has run out of time to say, in a single, barely there kiss. 

Then he thinks and feels nothing at all.


	7. Chapter Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What’s this? A relatively fast update? I felt very motivated and inspired to write this chapter, even if it ended up being the longest one yet. We are getting close to the end now guys. This is also where the story takes a much more obvious shift away from the show, it's still the Underworld but not as the show did it. Because well... that was painful and I love Greek Mythology way too much. Also here comes one of my favorite Gods of all time who was shockingly absent from the show. 
> 
> I tried to strike a balance between myth and show. Quote from a certain film does not belong to me. Enjoy!

## 

** Chapter Seven **

####  _**so I love you because I know no other way - Pablo Neruda**_

__  


He is falling.

Forever falling.

He falls without worry, without concern. The ground might be somewhere below him but Killian cannot bring himself to care. Eons pass as he falls and falls and _falls_.

He falls until quite suddenly he is not.

The landing is soft - so soft in fact that it takes Killian a little while to realise he is no longer falling but instead lying in a bed. It is possibly the most luxurious bed he has ever found himself in, thick pillows to sink deep into, more blankets than he thinks he has ever owned in his long life. It is heavenly, soft and yet firm, supporting his arch of his back perfectly and chasing away any hints of cares or pain. Killian doesn’t know how long he lies there, simply enjoying the softness of this bed, the warmth it inspires in him. He feels as though he could sleep forever in this bed and indeed, he finds himself dozing, lulled by the sense of comfort and security the bed somehow brings. 

(Softness should be a threat. Softness has no place in a slave or pirate’s life. Softness means weakness, softness turns you into prey and victim. He knows all this and yet. This bed tugs at something old and primal in him, something almost beyond conscious memory, something that tells him safety, tells him in no uncertain terms that this is safe.)

Finally, the smell of freshly cooked bread draws him up and out of the cocoon of blankets, hair sticking up all over the place from where he has been lying. The scent is delicious, his mouth watering at the thought of the still warm bread that must be the source of such a divine smell. It is only then, that he realises how hungry he is. He feels as though he hasn't eaten in weeks, a ravenous hunger that is only magnified by the delicious smell filling the room. 

Limbs ache with sleep, and part of him wants to just sink back into the bed, to ignore the smell and just let oblivion whisk him away once more. To not have to think and worry about anything and just let sleep take him. Killian knows he should be worried about something. The before is hovering on the edge of his consciousness, on the tip of his tongue. Something important has happened but he cannot remember what. He mentally scrambles for the before for a couple of seconds, grabbing at half formed memories and thoughts before giving up. The thoughts trickle through his mind like the sands of time. He should go and see where that freshly baked bread is. Killian nods to himself, a small smile on the edges of his lips at the fact he has come up with a plan. He feels ridiculously pleased with such a simple thing.

He shuffles out of the room and down the hallway, hand lifting to trail along the wall as he moves, tracing over the faded walls. Everything is vaguely familiar to him, as though he has seen this place before in his dreams. Feet lead him to the kitchen without hesitation, as though he knows the route instinctively.

A woman is standing with her back to him, bending over the table as she fusses with the various items scattered across it. The source of the delicious smells sits at the center of the table, surrounded by various other foods, a veritable feast of cheeses, butter, fruits. It just makes his mouth water all the more, a pang of hunger growing in his stomach. Eyes are pulled reluctantly from the food on offer to properly look at the woman.

All thoughts of eating vanish from his mind.

She is beautiful. Even with her back to him, he knows this, can tell with an unshaken certainty. She hums as she works, snatches of song drifting out from her breath, her long dark hair falling around her face. He knows that song. It awakens something inside of him, a memory of softness, of gentle arms around him, rocking him to sleep. Her song... Her song is a lullaby. 

Suddenly, Killian feels as though he is five years old again.

“Mama?” 

The woman turns around. Her eyes are the blue of cornflowers growing in the sun, an eternal warmth in them. She smiles, expression genuine, the corners of her eyes crinkling up at she looks at him. Hands brush against the apron around her waist, dusting off the flour that clings to them. There is something enduring domestic about her, about this moment, something he hasn’t felt for a very long time.

“Killian, my boy. My poor, sweet boy.”

“Mama...” Voice is choked, a thousand thoughts and feelings welling up inside of him. He wants to move closer, wants to wrap his arms tight around her and never let go. He wants to cry and laugh, all at the same time. Killian cannot seem to move though, feet frozen in place, eyes wide as he stares at the woman - no, as he stares at his _mother_. He’s missed her so much. It’s only faced with her, that he realises what that ache in his chest is - the ache of a loss so old he had forgotten he was mourning her still.

“You’ve been so brave my love,” she praises, lifting her hands in a placating gesture as he stands there, still unable to move, barely about to blink or think. The thought that this is his mother is running around and around in his head, a thunderous refrain that is drowning out everything else in its path. 

This... this is wrong. Somehow this is very wrong. The knowledge buzzes in the back of his mind, alarms going off that are growing louder by the second. The before is still a nuggling concern in his mind, not just the before that is recent but a before this moment that stretches far away into his distant past.

His mother shouldn’t be here. She shouldn’t be standing in front of him baking bread. He shouldn’t be able to meet her gaze head on. In his memories she is always so much taller than him, Killian had to tilt his head to look up at her. She would bend down, would kneel when she talked to him so they could be level. No, she shouldn’t be here at all. 

She had died. A long time ago now. And yet here she was, standing before him, a warm smile on her face. She had died. His father was dead too. As was his brother. As was he. 

“I’m dead.” It was a statement, not a question. He watches as her eyes dip to the table, staring at the worn wood as though it has personally offended her. Irrationally, Killian wants to grab those words and unsay them somehow, wants to remove the pain that is now evident in her features. It is clear that his mother never learned the same skills of her sons, never learnt how to hide her emotions behind an easy smile.

No matter his feelings, they can't change the simple truth of his words. He died.

Memories rush through him. Every moment of his life scrolling across his eyes, every word, choice and misstep that led to his death.

The hook in place of his hand seems to glow in the light, Killian hastily putting his arm behind him, suddenly ashamed of the disfigurement. He has struggled with the loss of his limb before, the change in how he lived for a long time, to the extent that he had injured himself forgetting he had a blade in place of fingers. How many times had he cut open skin in the first months when he had casually lifted his arm to scratch an itch? How many items of clothing had he ruined trying to come to terms with the change in his mobility? How many casks of rum had he swallowed to try and drink the anger and shame away, the burning thoughts of revenge, of not being whole, not being a real man anymore ringing in his ears?

How many people have tasted his hook, how many did he kill with it, just to prove a point?

He doesn’t want his mother to see the physical symbol of everything that was rotten and weak and wrong about him. He has never wanted his mother to see the worst parts of himself, to know what a failure her son had turned out to be.

She gives him the time he needs to wrap his head around recent memories, simply watching him calmly. There is a knowing smile on her face, something that hints at a wisdom beyond her apparent youthful years. 

“Is this the Underworld?”

It is strange. He had expected to feel more panic or despair upon dying and finding himself in Hades realm. Then again, he hadn't expected to see her again, to be allowed to see her - fire and damnation had been his expected destination, not a touching encounter with the first woman he has ever loved. The first person he ever grew to love.

“Not... exactly.” His mother replies, mouth set into a tight, worried line. Hands rise and fall a few times nervously before she grabs at the apron still tied around her waist, scrunching the fabric tightly together.

“You made some powerful friends as well as enemies Killian. Friends that cared enough to allow me to come. We were able to divert your journey, just for a little while. This isn’t the Underworld, it's more like... a side path you could have wandered down before finding your way to the gates.”

He doesn't remember her speaking in riddles before. Admittedly his memories of her are hazy things at best, surrounded by a sort of golden glow, a sheen covering every little fragment of her that he has secretly treasured over the years. He remembers broken snatches of song, eyes, a smile. The smell of freshly washed clothing and her lips on his knee after a fall. 

Then she died and the only good thing in his life had been his father and brother, right up until that night.

Then only his brother.

Then there was nothing. Strange, how there was always a little more innocence to lose. 

“I came to give you your options my son.” 

Killian cannot help but arch an eyebrow in her direction at that. 

“My options? I’m dead Mama.”

“Well... yes,” she admits, a loose shrug of her shoulders as she speaks. It’s something so effortless, so familiar. It’s a motion he’s seen in the mirror, in the reflection of the water as he tries to act as though he doesn’t care about the subject under discussion.

(There is so little he remembers of his mother, nothing of hers he still possesses. It comforts him deeply, to know that despite only being with her for a few short years before she made her long journey home, he had managed to learn something from her that he held as a part of him even now.)

“But that doesn’t mean you have no choice about the matter my starfish.” She is still talking, Killian blinking a few times as he struggles to understand exactly what she might mean - and that nickname, something he had forgotten, a memory gifted back to him.

Death was an end. It was always an end. Unless you were a Hero but while Killian might have fleetingly imagined he could reach such heights, he knew better than to believe himself worthy of that now. He draped the tattered cloak of a liar and a thief around himself, adopted the motions and actions of a righteous man as best he could without truly becoming one.

He mimicked being a hero, right up until the moment everything became hard and then instantly fell right back into old habits because it was easier to give in, than to try and be strong. No, death was an end for him. 

“I like your partner Killian. Even if she did kill you. You picked a fighter there, I imagine she must give you a run for you money when it comes to who is the most stubborn.”

It strikes him in this moment, how ridiculous in some respects this whole conversation is. His long dead mother appearing to him to offer him cryptic advice on how not to be dead and at the same time giving her approval on the person Killian had fallen in love with. 

(He is still beyond thrilled to know his mother likes Emma. He doubts he can ever win parental approval from the Charmings in the way he had wanted.)

“She is coming for you.”

“She is?” Hope flares in his chest, something hot and painful. A fierce fire that he isn’t quite willing to let roam free yet but one he nurtures inside of him nevertheless. Why would Swan come down here, for him? He had done such terrible, terrible things to her, had forced her even to kill him. Why would she want to expose herself to more pain? All he can offer her is pain.The recently ignited hope wars fiercely with newfound despair. 

“She shouldn’t. I’m a sickness.” Words taste like ash on his tongue, Killian pushing aside the hope as best he can. All he has ever done is hurt her.

His mother takes a step closer to him, anger flashing in normally placid eyes. “Don't you dare young man. I will not have you talking bad about yourself. You might think that, but this is her choice too. I’m not saying you can escape this. But you were not meant to die on that field and perhaps there is a way. Your destiny is your own here. You have to fight for it and it will not be easy. Or, you could pass on beyond this part of the Underworld. You could come home, to me.”

He can... try and return to Emma. The idea feels like a physical slap against him, Killian mentally and physically reeling. He could go home? Home has never been a settled place for him - for the longest time it was the Jolly, and wherever he roamed, whatever realm he happened to find himself in, running errands for Pan like the unwilling slave he was, or indulging in a spot of pirating on his way back to his chains, it was okay so long as he was with the Jolly. He was home so long as he was standing on that deck. Then Swan had come along and changed all the rules. 

Emma was home and home was Emma. No matter where she was - no matter what she was, saviour, dark one or just plain Emma.

(She was never ‘just’ anything. She was his love and he willing enslaved himself to her, in the hope she would hand back the key.)

Or he could stay here with his mother. 

The choice is painful, Killian swallowing a couple of times as he tries to weigh up the options. His heart is screaming in both directions and he cannot lie about how tired he is, how badly he wants to just lay down his burden and rest. After all this time, surely he has earnt his rest? Or, more likely, his eternal punishment. To be with his mother... or to be with his love. The easy road or the impossible road. 

“I want... I want to be with Emma. If she thinks I'm worthy... if there is any chance, then I want to be with her.” Words are mumbled, slipping out as he thinks them, Killian cringing a little as he speaks. He doesn’t mean them to be a rejection of her, he loves his mother, loves her more than almost anything but the thought of holding Emma even more one time, of getting to kiss her without some life or death situation getting in the way is just too tempting to ignore. 

(He’s died three times since the last near moment of normality they had been blessed with. So much for being a survivor.)

It is more proof that he isn't a good man, too selfish with what he wants over what would be best for her. He loves her too much to want to be apart from her, no matter how impossible the idea of being with her once more seems.

“That’s my Killian.” Her voice wobbles with unshed tears and her smile is proud. There is an undercurrent of sadness to it, pain that she wishes she could take on herself. “You were never one for the easy road where you? I’ll be waiting when it is your time, don’t you worry about me. You stay strong you hear me?”

Wind picks up around them, rapidly becoming a howling, screaming noise, It tears at clothes and hair, his mother’s long dark locks dancing wildly around them both. In that one moment, he is back on the streets of Storybrooke, the darkness waiting to claim his Swan.

His hand tightens around her own, gripping her tightly, the wind growing ever more powerful. The room drops away around them, as if ripped away by the storm until it is just the two of them in the eye of a hurricane. She looks around, watching the storm as it rages around them. Killian blinks and suddenly she looks a little less solid that before, almost fading at the edges.

“Our time is up starfish,” she tells him, that same, sad smile on her face. Killian shakes his head desperately, terror taking hold, a fear so much stronger than his last moments alive. Dying doesn't hurt as much as this.

“No, Mama, don’t go, please don't leave me alone, not again.”

He is a child again, begging and pleading not to be left behind. He knows his mother had never wanted to leave him, that she had fought and held on for as long as she possibly could but that knowledge, the cold logical aspect of it, pales against the raging emotional fire of his fears. He doesn’t want to be alone again, not again, please.

“Killian, I love you. I love all of you.” Her free hand reaches around his back as she speaks, gripping his hook and gently drawing it back towards her. Killian searches her face as she does, looking for any sign of disgust or worse, disappointment. There is nothing but love. She lifts both hand and hook upwards, clasping them both between her hands for a moment before dipping her head to brush a kiss against the tip of his hook, love still shining in every motion.

Impulsively, Killian surges forward, pulling out of her grasp to wrap his arms around her in a fierce hug, his mother's arms lifting in a mirrored pose. She is cool to the touch - they are both dead after all - but somehow the embrace is full of warmth.

“You will always be my baby boy. Nothing you have done has changed how much I love you. We will see each other again, I promise. Now go. Give your woman my best, she better not hurt you again, you hear me?”

\--

The sound of oars gently slipping into water gradually comes to his ears. The sensation of moving along water fills him, the steady rocking as they pass along this stretch of water, powered only by whoever is rowing. There is not even the hint of a breeze, and whenever he is, this is not a body of water he knows. Killian can tell when he is sailing on strange seas. 

He opens his eyes.

(When had he closed them?)

“About time you woke up.” The voice coming from the front of the small boat is male and gruff, worn with age and care. It feels like sandpaper rubbing against his skin, Killian having to swallow down the urge to flinch at the sensation. Whoever is talking speaks up again, voice as harsh and unwelcoming as before. “Don't normally take unconscious passengers.”

Killian is still so tired, aches all the way through his body but he forces himself into a more upright position, ignoring the protestations of his body. He is slumped in the back of a small boat, the side digging painfully into his back from the awkward angle he has found himself in. It’s going to leave a mark. Can the dead bruise? They can apparently still feel pain and he tries not to shiver with fear that knowing that. 

He doesn’t like the train of thought that follows after the knowledge that the Underworld is designed to allow the dead to feel pain. 

To try and distract himself, Killian looks around, taking detailed mental notes of his surroundings. The boat itself is worn and looks corroded somehow by the water, the rust coloured ship gliding through it surprisingly effortlessly, needing only gentle encouragement. Eyes drop to the water for a moment, taking in the pale green colour, and for some strange reason it turns his stomach. At first glance there is little to unsettle him, the water fast flowing around them, but a second, deeper look shows deeper currents within the water, something unnatural swirling in its depths. There is a hunger within this water, a desire to claim everything. Eyes flicker to the edges of the banks for a moment, watching as the water greedily tears chunks away, rocks dissolving in the water. 

It’s a wonder really it hasn’t eaten through the boat completely. Then again, the banks of the river seem to be constantly healing themselves, recovering against the neverending onslaught so perhaps the same magic is at work here. 

At the front stands a man who looks as though he needs the sleep far more than Killian does. His hair is shaggy and unkempt, growing wild,sticking up in every conceivable direction. Clothing matches the messy look of his hair, shirt little more the strips of rags held together by sheer will and determination. He stands tall though, long oar dipping easily into the water, sending them further along the river. 

“Irregular,” the boat man grunts, still not meeting Killian’s eyes. “Unburied. You shouldn’t be allowed to cross, not for a hundred years, but he asked for you personally.”

“Charon...” Killian mutters, at a loss for what else to say. He was dead and now he was having a conversation with the mythical ferryman of the Underworld. His life had always been a strange one, but really, what had it devolved to these past few years? 

“Aye. Expect a reward for figuring that out do you Pirate?” He snorts as he speaks, noise itching against Killian, an unpleasant sensation that he wants to claw out, rip away his own skin until he has escaped the words. 

He can't help but feel he has failed some sort of test. Of what exactly, he has no clue.

They row further in silence. Nothing is visible on the banks of the river as they glide past, a grey mist stretching from the edge of the water and away across the land. They might be the only beings in this place for all Killian knows and the idea unsettles him greatly. There might be hoards of things lurking in the mists watching this, an idea that equally unsettles him. Every inch of him is on high alert, his brain screaming danger.

“Who... who asked for me?” Killian refuses to take the silence lying down, he refuses to let the voice of Charon defeat him. Perhaps this is the start of that harder road his mother had spoke of. The urge to ramble rises in his mind, to just fill the area around them with words, to try and calm his racing thoughts.

For some reason he is nervous. 

(Of course he is nervous. Killian has been many things in his life - navie, a slave, upright, honourable, a loyal sailor, dishonourable, a pirate, a lover, a victim, a monster, a villain, a redeemed soul, a fallen soul. He’s never been dead before. He doesn’t know the rules.)

“ _He_ did.”

Killian waits a few more seconds but Charon simply keeps rowing, his eyes firmly fixing on the river ahead of them. He doesn’t know why the ferryman is so intent on keeping his focus in front of him, the river stretches ahead without any curve or twists, a straight line that he must have travelled along countless times.

“Right. Helpful.” Killian sighs, shifting a little to try and ease the ache of his muscles. Hand lifts to rest against his chest for a moment, pressing against the spot where he had been impaled. Shirt is intact, and even when he presses a little harder, whatever he is made of now is whole and unmarked. No marching wound to fit with his memory.

It was as if it had never been.

He cannot help but wonder bitterly if every aspect of his life has been cleansed as easily and completely as his injury.

It is what he wants isn't it? Not to be mourned, nobody to stand at his grave and weep, to chain themselves to his memory. He wants everyone - he wants Emma - to be able to move on easily, doesn’t he?

“Mess of contradictions aren't you pirate.” This time it is Charon who breaks the silence between them. “Rare to have someone like you, such blackness and light. Suppose I can understand why your arrival has caused such a fuss. Takes a lot to get _him_ in a flap.”

Head is spinning at those words, Killian unsure how he was supposed to take them. His arrival has caused a fuss? What the bloody hell?

Impossibly large metal gates rise up out of mists on the left bank before he can question Charon further and try and work out what was going on here. They rise high, higher than he can actually see, no matter how much he cranes his neck back to look upwards. The tops of the gate simply vanish into thick mist that seems to be more cloud than the swirling wisps and tendrils closer to the ground. 

Boat finally comes to a stop beside them, gently rocking in time to the currents. Even that seems to have stilled in strength somehow, no longer pulling parts of the bank away, instead lapping gently at the edges. Killian glances around as he stands, unable to keep his curiosity in check, even now.

A shadow lurks by the entrance, something large and monstrous, a beast in every aspect. He isn’t sure how many more times he is going to be surprised by this place - he suspects he hasn’t gotten close to the total. Three heads lift, two twisting and snapping at each other half heartedly before all focus back on the boat.

Cerberus. It backs away as Charon gestures at it, all three heads lowing in submission and taking a staggering step backwards, showing a clear path from the boat to the entrance, one of the large metal gates slowly swinging open. Killian is sure if he was standing here alone it would have ripped him apart in one of its many jaws, all fang and teeth and the promise of eternal pain. He’s not surprised few have escaped with this guard dog around. 

“Go through the gates to the Court of the Dead. Stay away from the mists if you know what's good for you. Spirits always looking for things that don’t belong to them, like a way out before their time. You don’t want to change places with any of them.” 

Killian is barely out of the boat before Charon is pushing off once more, the ferryman apparently in a hurry. The boat somehow turns around in between blinks - or perhaps it is Charon who has managed to move from one end of the boat to the other in that impossibly short space of time because suddenly he is heading back the way he came, back to the land of living to collect more passengers.

Cerberus growls. It is a warning not to be tardy, and while Killian has rarely - if ever - backed down from a challenge, he doesn’t fancy his chances against the beast. Keeping a wary eye on it, he slowly inches his way closer, making sure every movement is slow and exaggerated. No sense in setting it off. Growls continue, a deep rumble that echoes through the area, filling it until Killian has passed through the entrance. 

Gates clanged heavily behind him, the metal bar falling into place to lock it with a foreboding thud. He is standing in the land of the dead now, his path laid out at his feet.

The mists fill the landscape, as far as the eye can see, obscuring the few rocks and jagged edges of this wasteland. No, not a wasteland, not exactly. 

No man's land.

Killian tries to remember what he has heard of the Underworld. The Court of Hades is apparently where he is headed, to join all the souls that are destined to be judged. Vaguely he remembers tales of rivers - five rivers including the one he has travelled down already. Scattered around the court lie the different areas where all the judged souls reside. And apparently the Court in the center, the home of the Gods, the place where he is to be judged. 

He could run. Lose himself in the mists and hope against hope that he could retain enough of himself to be able to find Emma if - when - she comes for him.

(Some part of him cannot help but doubt his mother's words now that the warmth of the dream has faded and he is standing, stranded in the Underworld. Some part, in the cold reality of awakeness, cannot help but doubt that he even saw his mother. It was a dream. A lovely dream, one of the best he had ever been blessed with, but still, a dream. Some part scoffs at the idea that he, Killian Jones, would be given any kind of gift, that he could have made the powerful friends she spoke of. He is standing in the land of the dead, where anything is possible but the hope of actually seeing Alice Jones again is just one dream too far for him.)

Killian hunches down into the leather jacket he is wearing - he notes with some surprise that he is back in his more modern attire, instead of the darkness infused pirate garb from the Enchanted Forest - and starts walking.

He walks for what feels like miles. The path is a straight enough line, cutting through the barren landscape like a sword. The mists curl against the edge of the path, wisps occasionally reaching out across his path, curling towards him before pulling back, shy of actually touching him. Whispers skitter across his consciousness at times, voices tempting and pleading, trying to convince him to step to the side and leave the path. 

Killian frowns. Hunches deeper into his coat. He keeps walking, forcing himself to remain within the boundaries of the path. He walks until he can barely remember why he is walking or where he is going. He walks until it feels as though his feet have been rubbed away to nothingness.

He walks face first into the door of a castle that his tried brain is sure hadn't been there a moment ago. Door opens without a word, the path beckoning him on, through corridors and up stairs until it leads him to the throne room.

\--

The Lord of the Underworld stands before him.

In all honesty, it's a bit of an anticlimactic sight.

Killian wasn’t really sure what he had pictured, when he had thought of Hades, Lord of the Deathless Gods, with all those long and foreboding titles and epitaphs. Sailors had different Gods to those who toiled in the earth, but all of them feared and honoured the Gods of the dead. It was just good business practice. He supposes he has expected something terrifying, something worthy of worship and fear. 

Not a man in a neat brown suit and tight tie. His shoes are shined within an inch of their life - Killian always looks to a man’s boots to judge him, knows the care that has been taken on boots tells you a lot about the person wearing them. These are the boots of a man with a lot of power, a lot of energy to hand. A man who will ensure everything is done perfectly, will make sure no matter what is going on under the surface, everything will be perfect to the casual observer. 

The skin is a few shades greyer than would be considered normal for a human, but that could be easily explained away by a lack of sunlight, not as proof of divinity. Really, the only part of him that stands out at all, is the admittedly impressive sight of what is supposed to be his hair. Blue flames dance around his scalp, the motion constantly changing the style.

The man - God? - doesn’t so much as blink as they move apparently of their own accord, dancing to whims of their own. 

“I was hardly going to show you my true form, don't want to make you blind as well as a cripple. You mere mortals cannot handle the sight of an actual God.” Hades gestures to himself as he talks, motions slightly stilted, awkward, as though he is still learning how to move them properly, arm stretching out a little too wide and then almost hitting his own chest as he curves it back.

Killian’s eyes narrow a little as he mentally replays the words inside his head. He hadn’t said anything, so how could Hades have known he was thinking about how ungodlike the God actually looked?

Maybe everyone thought something along those lines and he had just gotten bored and thought the best way was just to say it anyway to get the whole thing out if the way 

Or could Hades read minds?

“Yes. Yes I can.” Hades replies as though the words had been spoken out loud. “Or I suppose a more accurate description is I can read your soul. I know everything about you Captain Jones. Every thought and desire you’ve ever had. I even know about your little visit from your mother, that was very sneaky of her, but we’ll get to that later.”

(So she had been real.)

“I think I managed to create a fairly accurate representation of what a mortal looks like, I do see a lot of you but creating new things has never been my department.” Hades stares down at his arms, a faint expression of distaste crossing his features as he examines his fingers. “I don’t know how you manage to live in such tiny little forms, its so restrictive. And having to _speak_ out loud every time you want to communicate properly with each other?” 

Hades shudders a little, arm dropping as he makes the motion. It flows a little smoother now, the God clearly getting to grips with this body he has created. Killian blinks a couple of times, simply staring at him in disbelief, trying to wrap his mind around what was happening. Out of everything he had expected after dying - pain, damnation, being taunted and tormented by those he had killed, he has to admit, having the literal God of the dead complain about a human body was not anywhere on his list. 

He’s normally better with the witty comebacks and snide remarks as he refuses to be cowed by those in power but this is something so completely new and Killian is a little ashamed to admit he is struggling. Hades seems to take the silence as consent to just keep talking, and it is clear that the God loves the sound of his own voice as he smoothly presses on.

“But, it is the way you are. The way you were made, and you cannot blame me for that, like I said, I don’t create. I wasn’t asked for input when they made you, and so some design flaws are inevitable I suppose. So... How did I do?” Gaze is expectant as he stares at him, waiting for an answer at last, for the other person in the conversation to actually contribute to it.

Killian knows he should say something sensible. Something calm and reasonable, comment on the suit or the shoes or anything except th-

“Most humans don't have fire for hair mate. It makes you look insane.” Words slip out before he even finishes the thought to not talk about the hair.

Well at least he knew he was still himself. Suicidal tendencies to talk back to beings more powerful than him and could squash him like a bug were certainly alive and kicking - even if he wasn’t.

“A joker still it seems. At least your sense of humour is still intact. As feeble as it is.” Hades lifts his hand up, fingers snapping sharply together as he pulls them back. Blue flames fade into short, pale brown hair, and now he just looks like a mild mannered businessman - going off purely looks, Killian thinks even the cricket would feel confident about taking on Hades in this guise. 

Hades claps his hands together, the sharp sound ringing around the throne room, Killian unable to help the tiny shudder that runs through him at the noise. Smile is still present on the God’s face, posture relaxed and yet Killian can tell that this has shifted into serious business, that they are finally getting down the meaty part of the conversation. 

“So. Captain Killian Jones. The infamous Captain Hook. Former slave, former Captain, former lover of a Saviour. Former Dark One. That’s a lot of titles, Hook. A lot of former masks you’ve worn in a very long life.”

A scroll of parchment appears in the air between them, Hades carefully taking it and unrolling it. It spills out on the ground rapidly, an extremely long list now visible to the pair of them. Despite himself, Killian takes a step forward, trying to read what is written there - and instantly wishes he hadn’t.

There are names, all written in a black, spider like hand. More names than Killian can count, filling the parchment, tiny letters squished together to allow maximum names in the space provided. There is still plenty of the scroll still rolled up, no doubt more names hidden from view, but he doesn’t need to see more names to understand what this is. 

He recognizes some of them. People he has killed, his own father sitting at the top of the long list. 

(What is far worse though, is how many he doesn’t know, how many are either only vaguely familiar or draw a complete blank in his mind. All those nameless people he has killed were never truly nameless and now the names stand in mute condemnation of him.)

“Did you know how many souls you have sent to me? You’re one of my best workers up there, keeping a steady flow of souls down. Or at least you were, before you had your change of heart. The saviour, Emma Swan was it? And then you went and became a Dark One, and I thought, well here, here you will start racking up the body count again. But no, instead you end up encouraging souls to leave my kingdom. It’s all rather amusing. I so rarely get to be surprised by you mortals anymore.”

“You're not... um... angry?” Killian asks, unable to help the note of nerves in his voice, the way he hesitated before actually asking the question. He still doesn’t understand what Hades wants from him, why he is wasting time talking to him - playing with him, instead of hurting him as he must want to.

No, he’s not even playing with him. Not really. Not the way a cat would with a mouse, there is nothing particularly cruel about anything he has said or done so far. It puts Killian on edge, far more than any verbal or physical torment would do, this endless waiting for the other shoe to drop, for Killian to understand what is going on once more. 

“Angry? Whatever for?” Tone is almost sickeningly sweet, an innocence that Killian doesn’t believe, not for a second. This God may not be tossing thunderbolts and outright smiting him, but he cannot afford to let his guard down around him - he is still all powerful.

He wants Killian to be the one to say it, to list his crimes as clear as day. Hades may have commented on it, but he hasn’t actually spelt out what had happened. A test, it's all a test. He has known men like this before, ones drunk on power - Killian has to admit, being a God means the ultimate power, but that just means the potential to be the ultimate drunk and maybe he had ruled out Hades being a cat too soon. 

(He’s been the plaything of more powerful men and monsters more times than he can count. He knows the feeling all too well.)

“There are _none_ like me Hook. So, what did you do?” Hades smiles as he speaks, words firm and demanding an answer, Killian feeling the pressure build up in the back of his mind, the desire to respond. 

Ah right. The mind reading thing. 

“I released the Dark Ones. I took souls from you and your kingdom without giving anything in return.” Killian replies, words low but clear despite that. He isn’t ashamed of what he had done - not really. His motivations hadn’t been the best when he had summoned all the Dark Ones, when it had been the darkest version of himself in control of his body and the little voice that had still been Killian had been reduced to little more than the subconscious, pressing and fighting and hoping to be heard in time. It had all worked out in the end, for those still alive of course. 

He isn’t going down without a fight. But he can’t fight until he knows what is happening and why is Hades dragging this out?

(Probably because he can read minds, Killian realises. He can read minds and knows this is already the perfect punishment for him.)

“True. But then why would I want yet more souls down here?” Hades asks and huh Killian had - well Killian had never thought of that. He was _Hades_. The God of the Dead. Surely that meant he, well, wanted the dead?

“I... what?” Not his finest response, Killian had to admit. 

“Plus you did give me something, something important to me. You. Such an old soul.” Hades actually closes his eyes as he says it, tongue flicking out to lick his lips, and that was downright terrifying, Killian internally proud that he suppressed the shudder that wanted to run through him. 

“That's the problem with you mortals. You think because I'm down here that I want all the souls, that I enjoy the endless parade of boring mortals with their boring lives and their boring mortality and boring issues, the same thing, day in, day out. I’m a collector Hook. I judge those who come before me, but all I am really interested in, are those few special ones. Most of what you sent were dregs but there were one of two little gems in all the rubble. One day I will have to tell you about a particular favorite of mine, a man you killed who was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Oh, there is irony in that one Hook, if only you knew...” 

Hades gives a little giggle as he speaks - an actual, honest to god, _giggle_ that sounds so unsettling coming from a being of such power. He has the air of a man who knows the punchline to a joke that Killian isn't even aware of and Killian hates that.

“But we can discuss all of that later. Where are my manners? I haven’t even welcomed you properly into my home. Have a drink on me Hook.”

Hades waves his hand, freely conjuring up a cup that he passes to Killian. It is ornate, more a goblet than anything else. Something that speaks to the power in this realm. It seems slightly warming, a comforting mix of something like honey and spices that would no doubt blend deliciously together in the mouth. 

He lifts the drink to his lips. The urge to drink is strong in his mind, a clamouring desire. Something tells Killian that it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to drink deep from this cup. The power swirling within the thick looking brew speaks of power, of the ability to - t-to - to something, and he knows this drink, he knows it even as he can’t place it. Knuckles turn white from the effort of holding it in place, straining against every foreign part of him that wants to drink. 

“No.”

“No?” Hades voice is quiet, unnervingly so. A deliberate politeness that Killian knows hides pure rage. He has spent most of his life in service to various psychopaths, from the low level cunning of Captain Silver all the way up to the demonic imp that was Pan. He recognizes the type, no matter what Hades might say. He knows this calm, he knows how much worse the storm will be that follows it. Knows and yet he will not back down, will not show fear or his back. Killian cannot hope to win but this isn’t about winning. He was never going to win against a God. This is about forcing Hades to show his hand, about trying to maybe just maybe learn a weakness he can tell Swan about.

If anyone is going to defeat a God around here, it's going to be her. There is nothing beyond that woman.

“What do you mean no? You refuse my efforts at hospitality? I demean myself by appearing to you in a mortal form so we may speak and you cannot even show the bare minimum courtesy? Do you know how honoured you should feel that I waste my time with you?” Shadows flicker around him as he speaks, growing larger and darker the longer they stand there. 

The blue flames are back on top of Hades head as he suddenly seems to tower over Killian, a cold fire in eyes that seem to bore into him, pressing deep into his very soul and peeling all the layers away.

“ **Drink**.”

He can feel the urge to apologise rising up in him, the pressure to appease by taking a sip of the drink. These urges are not his own, not natural. They rise up and press against him from the outside of his mind, demanding his attention, his obedience. It would be better to drink. Just a few sips, a mouthful or two. Just as a gesture, no need to anger a God over something so trivial. What harm is there is having a drink when it is offered in the spirit of hospitality? 

Killian clenches his jaw tighter, trying to will the words away. The whispers are not his own, the voice in his head may sound like him, but he knows it is Hades, knows it is this realm trying to force its wishes on him. Not again. Never again. 

He will not speak. He will not drink. 

Hades wants him to drink and that is reason enough to defy him.

(His mother was right. He was not the kind of person who would ever take the easy road, no matter the consequences. No amount of lashings as a slave had been able to beat that reckless stubborn streak out of him. Killian knows it is foolhardy - but it how he is. He doesn’t think he would change it, even if he could.)

“Having fun without me?” A new voice cuts through the tension between them, snapping the strings holding Killian tight as he takes a staggering step away from Hades, the goblet still clenched tightly in his fist. He can blink and breathe again, drawing in ragged breaths as the urge to drink finally recedes to a manageable level. 

Still, he doesn’t feel as though this newcomer is going to be a good thing. He’s never going to be that lucky. 

\--

Before he knows it, Hades is once again equal height to him, blue fire has once again transformed back into human looking hair and the God seems unable to even meet his gaze anymore, eyes flicking between the floor and the other side of the room. 

If Killian didn’t know better, he would think Hades was almost intimidated by the owner of that feminine sounding voice - but then who could possibly put Hades in the shade?

“I introduce to you, The Queen of the Underworld, Dread Persephone.” Hades intones, dropping into a graceful bow, arm extending towards the far side of the room, where the voice had originated from. Killian turns, despite himself to see the person in question. She is pale, ashen almost and yet beautiful, words from Henry's fairytale book rising in his mind.

_Lips red as the rose. Hair black as ebony. Skin as white as snow._

She strides towards the pair of them, an amused smile hovering on the edges of her lips. The very shadows themselves seem to part to give her room to move as she passes them. Her legs seem to go on forever, long and shapely. Every inch of her is designed to catch the eye, drawing attention to the Queen. What a Queen she must be.

In this form, she is the sort of woman men would fight for, go crazy for. Die for.

Killian feels she is at her most dangerous when she is at her most alluring. She is a Siren on dry land and he knows from personal, painful experience, how dangerous such beings are.

“I told you he wouldn’t drink. That’s a soul you owe me, my darling husband.” Persephone tells him as she reaches the pair of them, hand lifting to brush against her husband’s own, long fingers tracing over the back of his hand in a gentle greeting, tracing pale blue veins under the greying skin. Hades looks chagrined as he nods in agreement, something about the movements telling Killian that this is a familiar argument or conversation they have had many times before. The motions are too practised, too smooth, for this to be the first time they have done this. 

Her fingers drop away from Hades after a moment, pale silver eyes turning in Killian’s direction. They look like the moon, full, enchanting. He could stare into those eyes forever and not be aware of times passing. He could just... stand here... and stare. He would drink if she asked him too. 

She reaches out, plucking the goblet from Killian’s unprotesting fingers, swirling the think drink around and staring thoughtfully down into the cup. With the eye contact broken, he can breathe again, air slipping out in a stuttering exhale as he averts his eyes, suddenly fearful of what Persephone could command him to do. 

“It is the brew of Lethe,” Persephone tells him calmly, answering the question he hadn’t even thought to ask yet. 

Lethe. Killian knows he knows that word, but his mind still feels as though it is half asleep, sluggish by its normal quicksilver standards. Lethe. One of the rivers is named Lethe. It is... river water? No, it's not that simple, he knows it isn’t that simple. 

She laughs at his confused expression, a light melody that sends icicles running down his back. It is the sort of laugh the wolf would give before devouring its prey, the last taunting sounds as the jaws of the trap sprung up around you. 

“You drink to forget all your past cares. You drink to forget. It is the key to leaving this place, little man.”

Words are heavy, filled with the painful realization of what the drink would have done. He remembers now. The brew of Lethe wipes away all memory, cleanses the soul completely and allows it to pass on without any pain of its mortal life. Without remembering those they had loved in their mortal life. He would have forgotten Emma.

She half turns, tilting her head a little, long dark hair tumbling artfully over her shoulder, and every motion is practised, calculated. It reassures him almost, to watch Hades as he reacts, to see the way pitless eyes soften and tenderness fill them.

Even the God of Death, it seems, is in thrall to another.

(How _mortal_ of him.)

Her smile grows, the first genuine expression he has seen on her. He misses Emma, the emotion creating a hollow ache in his chest. He misses Emma so much.

Persephone blinks slowly, attention refocusing on Killian, that softness vanishing into sharp, cutting edges.

“There are others in this realm, that have refused to drink. Others who have not been offered such a gift and so cannot leave, ones who have too many ties to the mortal world to be able to pass through our hands.” Her expression is similar to one Hades had worn when they had first met, something smug and all knowing, and utterly fake. He hates it equally on her. 

The dislike of that expression helps clear his mind further, shaking loose the cobwebs in his mind. He doesn’t understand the power in her eyes, not completely. She is a Goddess, she is beyond him. She is almost certainly the enemy.

Killian is careful to avoid meeting her gaze completely, eyes skirting around her own as his hand curls into a tight fist. Tiny half moon impressions form on his palms from how tightly he is pressing his nails into skin, digging deep.

He is terrified but refuses to show it any further, he will not be a morsel for them to play with. Killian forces his body to relax slightly, slouching into a defiant pose, a smirk he most certainly does not feel on his face.

“What do you want love? ‘Fraid I’m already taken for but if you need a real man, I could maybe oblige a lady.”

(He may as well go down swinging.)

She turns to face Hades, passing the goblet back to him, the ornate object vanishing in a puff of pale blue smoke, easily ignoring Killian’s attempt at bravado.

“You had your try, dearest husband. Now, it's my turn.”

The throne room dissolves around them. 

They reappear in a cell. No. A garden? Killian isn’t sure what he is standing in anymore. It is too closed to be a proper garden but too open compared to any jail cell he has ever seen. A wall runs around the area, the ceiling open to the reddish sky. Colour runs riot through the area, a marked contrast to all the pale grey and sickly green he has seen up until this moment. All manner of plants grow haphazardly around the area, a glorious 

A pomegranate tree grows near the center, where they stand in what might have once been a small temple. Columns reach up towards the sky like broken bones, sharp, bleached white edges jagged and ruined. Some are tilted at odd angles, as though suspended mid-fall. The roots of the tree have grown wild and far, and now that he looks at them, Killian can see that the roots are the cause of the disruption to the temple like structure, parts of the roots poking out of the surface and unheaving the foundations of the building until it was in this semi ruined state. Fitting perhaps, that life has managed to claim a tiny victory here, even if just this. One column is even lying flat on the ground, half buried by the soil, a dark, rich looking fertile dirt that seems so at odds with the dull grey he has seen everywhere else in the Underworld. 

“You are indeed an honoured guest Killian,” Persephone tells him, voice dry, the Queenly woman lifting a hand in silent greeting to some vines that are growing up the side of one of the pillars. “Few mortal souls are allowed here. My own little corner of this domain. It is so hard to keep anything alive in this world but then just because something is hard work doesn’t mean we should stop trying to achieve our goals.” 

“I’d be more worried if you couldn’t grow things, considering it's your thing and all. Can we just get on with the torture or whatever it is you have planned? Give the big dramatic speech, make your threats and so on.” He huffs, trying his best to act as though he doesn’t care.

Persephone’s fingers trace down his cheek, the touch ice cold, motion leaving ever so tiny frost crystals in its wake. He is taken aback for a moment by how different she is, the two faces she seems to present to the world at almost the same time. The ice queen of the underworld and the warmth of a harvest, plant goddess. 

There is no force in her touch as she lifts his chin up to try and meet her gaze and yet Killian finds himself compelled, wanting so badly to obey the unspoken demand there. He grits his teeth as his gaze drifts upwards, blue eyes darting around to stare at her forehead, where hair meets skin, before skipping down and to the side, examining the delicate curve of her left ear. Killian looks everywhere he can, aside from her eyes. He cannot allow himself to meet her gaze directly. 

Finally, he is able to pull his eyes down, staring resultly at the floor and the small plants that are growing underfoot, pale red flowers uncurling and straining upwards, as though trying to physically reach the Goddess standing above them. 

(It feels wrong to lower his eyes in submission. It is not Captain Hook’s way of doing things.)

“You should have drank, little man. Forgot your troubles, followed the paths and passed onto wherever fate my dear lord has decided for you.” There is almost a hint of sympathy in her voice, as though she pities him, regrets whatever is about to happen now. 

“Now... now we must test you. My Lord has made deals with mortals before. They almost always fail of course and yet, bless him, he tries again. He wants so badly for you to prove yourselves worthy of the gifts you have been given. But you and I, Killian, we are made of less fanciful stuff. We know the truth. The dead keep what is due them. What is ours. And you, little man, are mine.”

Hand tightens on his chin suddenly, the sharp stab of a thousand tiny pinpricks digging into his skin, a spiderweb of fire flashing across his face. Killian cannot help it. He looks up - right into her eyes. 

Pale smoke curls around her, something almost alive in this moment, a white shadow to the flickering darkness in the Throne room. Killian can see it out of the corner of his eye but he can’t turn away, can do nothing but stare enraptured at the vision of beauty in front of him. Dimly, some part of him struggles in panic, pushes again and again. There was a reason why he didn’t want to look at her, he knows there must have been a reason... but... he... there was a reason... her eyes are so beautiful. 

She reaches out, the translucent smoke moving with her, to trace across his wrists, dancing up to touch at his throat. Silver smoke solidifies into thick, silver metal, heavy cuffs curling tight around the areas she had marked, claiming him easily. Large, looping chains form between cuffs and collar, connecting them together. 

The ends of the long chains dig themselves deep into one of the pillars, effortlessly trapping him within the boundaries of this walled garden without the need for guards or further locks. They shimmer with untold magic and all Killian can do is stand there and accept this. 

(Why doesn’t he hate this?)

“What is it about you Killian, that makes your soul cry out to always belong to someone?”

\--

Time is measured in visits from Persephone. 

There is the dark patches, when she is gone and he is alone in the garden, when his chains allow him limited movement and he can do little but sit huddled against the pillar he is trapped by and just wait for her return. His brain feels frozen, an icy prison of its own making without her. Then there are the golden, hazy moments, the ones where she is there like the sun, warming him and letting his mind blossom once more. Those are the moments when time seems to flow once more, when he crawls on his hands and knees if she asks it of him.

(He thinks he would have drunk long ago if she offered him the chalice again. He thinks he would have forgotten everything even without the drink if she had asked him too. But that would be too easy for her.)

She talks of Emma. 

He knows he should miss Emma. 

In this state, he can’t feel much of anything. 

“Your woman is getting closer to the gates. And she is not alone. I do so hate it when mortals invade my kingdom.”

Not... not alone?

It was bad enough to imagine that Emma was coming down here, but to think she was dragging others with her - that he was the cause of yet more pain and suffering, and Persephone promises that any mortal coming to the Underworld will only suffer. He doesn’t doubt her words. Why would he? He remembers enough to know that Emma shouldn’t be here, that she deserves better. Who would possibly be coming with her?

Well he knows who. They might not approve of him - or, in his darkest, most self pitying moments, he feels they might not even like him - but Killian knows her parents would follow her anywhere, no matter their own personal disapproval. 

“You're more boring than I thought like this. I thought I would like a pirate as a puppy but I suppose your fire is part of what made you interesting.” She taps her chin thoughtfully before giving a slow and very deliberate blink. 

A fraction of the fog lifts from his mind. Why... why is he just sitting here? He should be doing something... Eyes dully rest on the pomegranate tree, watching the large red fruit as they hang low in the garden. Anyone could reach out for the fruit, break it apart and scoop out the edible middle. 

“You ate the seeds on purpose.” He half speaks, half whispers his words, attention firmly fixed on the fruit and only partly aware of what he is saying. Behind him, he hears a sharp intake of breath before her quiet laugh rings out. 

“Perhaps. What is a Goddess of the harvest to a Goddess Queen? But hardly the topic at hand Killian. We are talking about your woman and really considering what you both went through, I want more focus from you on this.” 

It is the topic. She ate on purpose, she played her mother, her husband, all the Gods on Olympia. She is the most dangerous creature in all of the Underworld. His mind feels even clearer now. How long has he been sitting here useless? Why hadn’t he fought more? Why would she entrap him only to free him? Boredom? Wanting an actual challenge? What evil plan does she have in mind for Emma? How can he stop her? Questions whirl frantically around his mind and he doesn’t know if she can read minds too or if he merely speaks aloud, but whatever it is, she answers. 

“My lord isn’t evil. Not am I.” The look she gives him is one of disgust, mingled with pity. “How small you are now Killian. Your mind is so restricted, so tiny to think in such flat terms. I had hopes of you... you had taken all that darkness within yourself, you had expanded your horizons and I had thought you might see beyond the walls of mortal minds but alas. You see us as something you can define. I promise you now, we are beyond what you know and understand. While we love and care for each other, do not think to use any labels of your own to explain us.”

To his surprise, Killian find himself actually believing her. He isn’t sure what to make of the revelations she lays so casually before him like scraps of his reality are warping before his eyes. How is he supposed to fight against them if they claim they aren’t villains? Worse, if they actually are not? It brings to mind Hades words from before, when he had expressed distaste at all the souls and the idea that he might want the dead. 

“Would you like to know a great secret Killian?” Persephone asked, changing the subject abruptly, a knowing smile on her face. He isn’t sure he is ready for more truth. She leans closer to him, so close he can smell her perfume, a faint mix of freshly tilled soil and midnight flowering jasmine. 

“People almost always go where they believe they belong. A self righteous man will always quake and fall apart in front of the divine seat of judgement. Oh my Dearest judges them, but he only passes sentence on what truth they hold in their hearts. Think of it. All those men who do terrible things but for the right reasons, who justify their dark and terrible crimes because the end result is good. The ones who willingly commit evil and think they have no choice. They stand by the throne and all those lies slip away until they are left with the knowledge that they deserve to be punished. And so they are.” Arms lift above her head as she stretches, body gently arching like some giant cat. 

“I look at you Hook and wonder what my dear Dread Lord would see if he judged you? Where do you think you deserve to go?”

Killian flinches. He cannot help it, her words rubbing harshly at a wound that is far too tender and open still. She laughs again, sound as cutting as before. 

“That’s what I thought my sweet. Be grateful Hades has not sat in judgement yet upon your soul... Of course... occasionally mortals get it so wrong that my Dread Lord has no choice but to step in and send them somewhere else, to their great surprise. Speaking of a surprise..”

Fingers click together, snap echoing through the walled area, somehow growing louder with each vibration until his ears are ringing with the noise. Cuffs and collar snap open at the wordless command, the heavy metal chains dropping to pool harmlessly around his feet. And just like that. He is free. She waves a hand towards one of the walls, as though he might have any idea which direction it is supposed to be. 

“Out there, on the banks of the rivers, are all the souls yet to be sorted. Judged. Some fled my lord and as punishment are granted exactly what they wanted, to not be placed. So they exist in purgatory, not one thing or another. What is that delightful human saying? Be careful what you wish for. Some of course, are simply not ready to be judged, for whatever reason. Normally it looks very different but today you will find it looks like that sweet little town of yours. My gift to you, a reality you and your friends will understand while you aim to complete your labours.” She gives him an expectant look, hands now clasped together in front of her, almost as though she is praying. 

All he can do is stare at her, yet more questions burning in his mind.

“Why?”

“I told you Hook. We have made deals with mortals before, and they fail. We told her this but they also never listen to our warnings.” She sighs as she speaks, shaking her head a little. “Every mortal thinks they are special. Blessed in some way, that they will trick us. Run along little man. Run to your test. I hope you are worth it, she has put a lot on the line to try and save you.”

“What did she offer?” A cold kind of dread fills him, and suddenly he is afraid in a whole new way for Emma. What could she have possibly offered that would have interested Gods? “What is the test? How will I know it?

“If I told you that, it wouldn't be much of a test now would it?” She chides him lightly, clicking her tongue at him as she does so. “I have dwelt above and below for longer than your tiny little mind can possibly comprehend and a mortal has yet to prove me wrong or truly surprise me before a flicker of possibility. Still, I give you all the chance.”

Killian finally wills his legs to move, to climb back to his feet. They ache and tremble under him, and not for the first time he wonders how long he had sat there. Movement is hesitant, limbs as weak as a newborns as he starts to move. Her voice catches at him, freezing him in place.

“Oh. One last thing.” The smile she gives him is utterly without warmth or feeling, as though it is an expression she has practised in front of a mirror without any understanding of the motives behind it. He should have known. There is always a sting in the tale. Her hand lifts, pale white, near transparent smoke curling around her fingers as always as she points one upward. 

“You may ask one question and I will answer to aid you in your test. Aside from what it actually is of course.”

One question, something to aid him. He grits his teeth together, momentarily at a loss. He can’t afford to waste this chance and yet she expects him to ask something useful without any context. Perhaps this is part of the test. One question... well, Killian knows what he wants to ask, he just doesn’t know if it would be useful. Then again, he can’t think of anything general enough to be helpful on a none defined test so really, what did it matter? 

“Did it work?”

For an instant, he thinks he sees a flicker of something like surprise pass across glacial features before she is staring blankly at him, expression neutral.

“Did... what work?”

“My sacrifice. Did it bloody work or not?” Hand curls into a fist as he stands there, torn between running now the chance of escape and a reunion with his Swan is at hand and the desire to know if any of it had been worth it. Frustration bubbles up in him, snapping through some more of the delicate bindings she had laid across his soul. His head aches from all the riddles she speaks in, all the double and hidden meanings in every word. 

“That. Is your one question. You can ask anything to help you pass whatever tests and trials lie ahead and you choose that? Are you sure?” 

“Anything you say in regards to that will have a double meaning, O Queen,” Killian replies, forcing down the ruder words he wishes to say. There is still a slight sneer to the way he says her title, something that borders on insolence. Killian cannot change who he is completely. Not after he has only just regained himself. 

“It did and it didn’t.” Persephone replies, picking her words with care. Killian rolls his eyes, a huff slipping out as he momentarily forgets he is dealing with an immortal, powerful being. Again with the double speak, the answer that was never an answer. The pair of them seemed incapable of giving a straight answer to anything. 

“Oh your little pout is just too irresistible. Fine. You destroyed the Darkness as you know it, no more immortal evil. Congratulations you fundamentally altered the fabric of your world and nearly ended the whole concept of good and evil.” She gives him a slow, ironic clap as she speaks. “A piece of it remains. A shard, refashioned in the heat of your actions, forged anew in the destruction of Nimue and all who followed her. Darkness must exist in some fashion and unluckily for your little attempt, there was someone there only too willing to take it on.” 

“Rumplestiltskin,” he seethes, almost spitting the name out in disgust. Just when he thought he had seen the depths of the man’s depravity, when he thought he was starting to understand him, he goes and does something like this. Killian had known that Rumplestiltskin wanted the power of the Darkness back, even if he couldn’t comprehend why, but he hadn’t realised the lengths he would go to. The effort it must have taken to rip some of it back from the oblivion Killian had been so intent on forcing it into.

“Give the man a prize. Still, I wouldn’t judge him too harshly - for one, when he finally returns here, he will judge himself. Two, he opened the portal that summoned Charon to take your lover on the river. Refused at the last second to join them, something about not being strong enough to get them back and left them to make their way here alone.” 

Killian does feel a little relief, as selfish as that might be, in knowing that he doesn’t need to worry about looking or speaking to that pathetic excuse of a man. Some part of him wishes the Dark version of himself had just killed the crocodile and been done with it. The other parts hate how it would have been wrong and how Emma might not have been able to forgive him. The crocodiles absence makes their escape that much harder and relief easily flips back into an all familiar self loathing, that he would put his own weaknesses before what they needed. They need to escape.

“Take comfort in this. The Dark One, as you understand it, is no more. Even I cannot see what your Crocodile will become but his destiny will eventually lead him here. All threads pass through here in the end. How do you think the Underworld will judge him then?” The rock face she had pointed to starts to tremble and shake a little as Persephone talks. 

Rocks groan as they start shifting of their own accord - wait, no, that’s not right. They move to her will, her direction. Reforming themselves as she demands, as she could have so easily demanded of him. An archway appears where before there had been only solid wall, a path once more laid out in front of him. 

Not knowing what else to do, Killian takes it. 

\--

He can’t breathe.

Not that he needs to breathe. He’s dead. It’s funny how the body doesn’t seem to care - not a body, a spirit? He has no real physical form and yet here he stands as he had once been.

His mind even recreated his hook instead of his hand, lucky him. Killian supposes it makes sense, he's lived far longer with the metal weapon attached to his stump than he has those few early years with two hands.

He can't breathe.

He stands at a crossroads, the Court of the Dead firmly behind him. In front is a fairly accurate recreation of Storybrooke, everything just ever so slightly off, colours a shade or two dimmer than they should be. There is absolute silence, not a single noise disturbing his thoughts at he stares.

It is a town of the dead after all.

There are three paths at his feet, all leading in different directions, all promising different rewards, different answers to different questions.

He can't breathe.

To the North stands a woman in full pirate regalia, gaze confident but masking a hidden sadness he knows only too well.

“Milah?”

He can’t breathe.

To the West stands a man in a sailor's uniform, sharply at attention, proud of having achieved his ambitions at last.

“Liam?”

He can't breathe.

To the East... well, Killian had already known who would be standing a little way down that path. Her form flickers in and out, as though he is viewing her through a poor magical connection compared to the other two who are whole and clear.

“Swan?”

He. Can’t. Breathe. 

Is any of this real? 

How is he supposed to choose between these people? Milah is his past, and such an important part of his life. Killian loves her still. Some part of him will always love her, will always miss her and mourn her even though he refuses to keep dying with her. So much of who he became, the good and the bad - so much bad - are thanks to her. She is the reason he lived as long as he had. He is the reason she died as soon as she had. 

How can he face her after everything he did? She proves him a coward.

Liam is his brother, torn from his grasp too soon, the memory of his dead weight in his arms haunting so many waking and sleeping moments. He kept the Captain's Quarters the same as his brothers, made himself sleep in there ever night at penance for his many failings, even as he committed them over and over again.

How can he face him, knowing he turned into an even more pathetic version of their father? He proves him a scoundrel in the worst sense.

Emma. Emma is his future if they can both be brave, if they can somehow beat the odds yet again and finally prove to the world that they belong together.

But how can he face her, after everything he put her through? After convincing her to kill him? She proves him unworthy.

And yet - and yet he can be brave. He can be a dashing scoundrel in the best possible sense.

(He can... be worthy? Killian isn't sure on that one yet, not completely.)

Killian doesn’t want to believe it is his Milah and Liam down those paths. Shades, phantoms, lies - anything is better than the idea it is really them. Anything is better than the thought they have spent hundreds of years trapped here. They had to have moved on by now. They deserved peace, not to be trapped in limbo, cursed to wander the shores of the riverbanks and Killian cannot allow his heart to waver and doubt.

(His heart screams for it to be them.)

The winds rip through him as he takes a staggering step to the east, drawn to Emma like the moth to a flame. Drawn to the person he knows is real, the one he believes is here. He takes another painful step east, wind increasing in strength with each passing step, icy cold air trying to fling him backwards. It is the same tornado that ripped his mother from his arms. It wants to undo any hope in his heart, wants to leave him bruised and broken, denied his chance at finding solace in Emma’s arms. 

Through the roars of the wind, he thinks he can make out two words screamed in some unhuman voice, too distorted to even determine gender;

Not. Yet. 

Curse them. Curse the Gods and their joy of toying with mortals for their sport. To give him a choice and then refuse to honour it, but instead force him down the paths in the order that they have already chosen. Killian would rather no choice than a lie wrapped up as freedom. He knows that life only too well to ever welcome it into him again. 

With a scream of frustration, he swings blindly with his hook, lashing out at the wind as though it was some physical entity he could defeat.

_And isn’t that your problem little man_ , taunts a voice that sounds like Persephone. He can’t tell if it is in his head and imaginary or truly echoing around the windswept streets. All he knows for sure is that it is as biting as the heavy currents of air themselves. _So quick to anger, to rush to some physical judgement or action without thinking it through. Not everything can be solved by a hook._

Of course, he knows that. He knows so many of his problems are caused by his own actions, that even his feud with the crocodile is partly the result of hot headed actions on his part and a chilling anger on Rumplestiltskin’s side. What else can he possibly do though? He has no magic, no great skills or talents. He is nothing more than a weapon, a sharp hook with a body attached. 

He wanted to pick Milah. He wanted Liam. He wants Emma. He can’t bare the thought that he is somehow betraying their memories by going towards the one who is living, but equally, he can’t bare the idea of chasing after phantoms of the past when his living, breathing future has risked everything to come down here after him. Is this the test? Picking between his three loves and forcing his heart to shatter into three pieces only to snatch the choice away at the last minute.

_Use that brain little man, if you have one._

(It almost feels as though the voice that is - maybe - in his head is trying to help, to afford advice.)

The tornado of wind blasts again, finally knocking him off his feet and sending him flying through the air in a sweeping, violent gesture. He is spinning and tumbling through the air, his very breath torn from his lungs by the sheer force of it all. 

He still can’t breathe. 

Killian loses all sense of direction as he flies, flung this way and that, at the mercy of the ever shifting currents of frantic air as the tornado spins through the otherwise silent streets. The familiar sight of the large clock that towers over the main street comes into view, Killian’s eyes widening in shock and then horror. He barely has time to process the sight of it getting larger and larger - _closer, I’m getting closer, shit I’m going_ \- before his body smacks heavily into it, flung into the clock with all the force of the storm, glass shattering under his body as he flies inside the building. He is ripped back out a second later, and if Killian was still able to take note of things he would have been relieved to see his leather jacket taking most of the damage, absorbing the many rips and cuts from the shattered glass of the clock face. 

The unnatural wind dies down without any warning or fanfare, vanishing as quickly as it had begun and sending Killian tumbling down to the ground. His last thoughts are a mix of panic without direction, the chilling awareness that the pavement is getting closer every second. Then, all is darkness. 

\--

Groan slips through his lips as consciousness slowly returns to him. Pain is the first thing he is truly aware of, a deep, throbbing ache in his head, rapidly followed by little stinging sensations all over his hand and face, wherever his bare skin had made contact with broken glass. He groans again, feeling the cuts around his mouth spring apart with the movement and great, this body he had imagined apparently came with blood as well as the sensations of pain. How absolutely marvellous. 

Eyes blink slowly open, a fuzzy face hovering in view. He blinks again, the image sharpening into features that have haunted his dreams for so many years, long dark hair hanging around her face. Instantly, the face blurs, tears filling his eyes as he realises who is leaning over him. 

Milah.

Rising up behind her, he can see the clocktower of Storybrooke, the hands ticking slowly over the large broken patch he has apparently created during the tornado, glass splintered and shattered, half of it open to the blackness of the room inside.

(Persephone hadn't mentioned a time limit in the test but Killian finds himself captivated by the sight of the clock face nevertheless and the fear that she could change her mind in an instant, could decide that they had failed without any hint of warning. He is almost out of time and the clock seems to know that, seems to mock his faint hopes.)

“Killian? Is it... is it really you?” Milah asks, tone so hesitant and uncertain. 

It breaks his heart all over again. He doesn't know how time passes in the Underworld, if you are even aware of the changing of the seasons. Some part of him hopes not, because that would mean she knows how long she has been trapped here. How she must have marked the passing of time without seeing those she cared for and been haunted by the idea that they had just passed on without her.

He should answer but all Killian can do is stare at her face, greedily drinking in features that had become faded in his memories until she had appeared in his dreams as little more than the drawing he had saved on her.

He can see her eyes. He remembers her eyes again. A precious gift, and one he will treasure the rest of his days - afterlife days.

She is still looking at him, waiting for an answer to a question he has never thought he would be faced with. All he can think of, is a question of his own, groaning once more as he pushes himself into a sitting position. He leans against her, winded by the simple action, taking the moment to gather his breath before speaking at last.

“Milah, love, why are you still here? You should have moved on, you should have been at peace.”

Is it his fault? He hasn't been able to avenge her death and there had been many nights, sitting alone in his quarters with only some rum for company that he had worried she wouldn't be able to pass on until he had made right her death and extracted revenge on the monster who killed her.

“I couldn't. Not without knowing... not without Baelfire.”

Oh, of course. How could he have been so blind, so foolish? So selfish to think it was about him, and his crusade, when she would have the noblest of motives trapping her here. She had abandoned her son before, had died regretting it, thoughts of the boy left behind to the tender mercies of a coward, the fear of what would become of him now his father was a Dark One. No wonder that would manifest in her the determination to stay here until she knew what had happened to her son. She couldn't have expected to wait so long, for her child to live as long as he had, and even now to not know what had become of him.

Killian just wished he had a better tale to tell her, a hiss of a sigh slipping out as his ribs protested at the movement, bones grinding painfully. 

“I let him down love. I let you both down, I tried to do right by him and I ended up doing so much worse.” Somewhere along the line, he has reached out, his hand finding her own and clasping it tight.

“Is he...” Milah starts to ask, the question fading from her voice before she can finish it. She doesn't need to finish it - he knows what she is asking, Killian giving a slight nod back at her.

“Aye. I'm sorry. He... he's gone. He was trying to find a way back to his family, to those he loved. He meddled with some powerful magic and it cost him... but he helped save a lot of people in the process.”

Half truths taste bitter on his tongue but this is not his tale to tell, not fully. It is a complicated enough tale as it is, full of curses and evil witches and Killian failing her family yet again when he let Baelfire walk out of the hospital, when he knew a little of what the other had done but had still given in without further protest. It was another example of how weak he really was.

(How can he tell her the truth? That her son had ended up sacrificing himself for his father, the man who had murdered her? He can't be that cruel.)

Her whole body gives a shudder as she processes his words, as she tries to understand something she must have long suspected. Her son is dead. Dead and Killian hopes with all his heart, that Baelfire has passed on, that like his own mother, he has moved from this place and found eternal peace. Milah climbs to her feet, helping him slowly up a moment later, the pain and agony still etched clearly on her face. 

Not for the first time since arriving in the Underworld, Killian finds himself at a loss for words. He has dreamt of being reunited with Milah more times than he can possibly count and now that he is standing in front of her, half in her arms, the many words fail him. 

“I’ve missed you,” he breathes at last. Something so simple that cannot truly express the ache of longing that has filled him for so long. At the same time, it seems to sum everything up, small words that convey everything because they are that simple, stripped down to the base elements of what they had been. 

“And I you, love,” she assures him, smiling through her tears as she leans close. Ever conscious of the ache in his ribs, Killian stretched his arms around her, drawing her into a gentle embrace. “Tell me, did you find your peace? Please tell me you found happiness after my passing.”

“I...” Words tremble on his lips, begging to be said and he isn’t ashamed of his love for Emma, he could never be ashamed of that. He just doesn’t want Milah to hurt even more. Still, he has to be honest. He owes her this much and more besides. “I did. I do. I love her very much.”

A piercing scream cuts through the air before he can say anything else, something that chills him to the core - Killian half feels it would have frozen his blood if he still had any. He shifts a little, attention finally turning from Milah to look down the misty streets to where three... creatures stand. Or fly. They flutter a few feet above the ground on large, bat like wings supporting them. From this distance it is hard to make out any features of the old looking woman, impossible to tell if the hair is truly snakes or not - they certainly seem to be moving as if alive. Then again, he doesn’t need to see the details, not after that sound, not after bat wings and three of them.

He knows what those foul beasts are. 

Erinyes.

Winged furies. 

Killian blanches at the sight of them. He has heard tale of them before, demons sent to punish those who had committed the gravest of sins - including murdering your parents. Invisible to the mortal eye more often than not, they wouldn't stop unless called off or their victim had been driven completely insane.

“Oh, they aren't here for you,” Hades casually informs him, the God silently appearing beside the pair of them. Killian can feel Milah’s startled flinch as she half jumps, pressing herself further against his jacket. He can't help but wonder if she had ever faced Hades before, if she had been offered the drink and refused it. Or if her love for her son had outweighed even the possibility of passing on.

“After all you are already dead and the crones do prefer to focus their attention on the living, on those who are yet to be judged.” Hades raises an eyebrow at him, in perfect mimicry of Killian. “But you are right, they do punish those who murder their parents.” 

He points towards the group at the other end of the street, a good few hundred feet beyond the furies, and Killian starts a little at the sight of them. How had he missed seeing them before? A red jacket and blond hair shimmer into sight, Emma standing at the head of the group, proud and tall.

Emma. 

For one earth shattering eternity of a second, he thinks Hades is pointing at her.

Then, a figure in a deeper red moves to the side of Emma, arms moving in gestures that even from this distance he can tell is born of pure frustration and everything clicks rather horribly into place. 

Regina.

They are coming for Regina. He needs to warn her, he needs to warn all of them.

Killian blinks and suddenly Hades is in front of him, blocking his path before he can take more than two steps. The God’s hand is on his chest, over where his heart would be, if it still existed as a living organ and he cannot seem to move. Fingers dig into his chest, into the hollow and - Killian doesn't understand. Suddenly his heart screams in the pain of being squeezed, long cold fingers wrapping themselves around him and demanding obedience. Killian freezes in place, body arching up in sudden agony, every nerve ending on fire.

“Sorry Jones, can’t have you remembering you’ve seen this. Not. Yet. Open wide and drink.”

He opens his mouth without protest, swallowing the three drops of water offered, the thickness of Lethe heavy on his tongue and mind. Dimly, Killian is aware of the pressure on his heart receding as Hades pulls back, as he commands Milah to drink as well. Memories grow hazy, slipping through his fingers like grains of sand. There is something he needs to remember, something important. Danger... he needs to warn... someone. About something. 

He blinks again, world going a little blurry around the edges before he and Milah are alone once more, Killian looking around the area as he scrabbles to work out what is happening. 

There. At the other end of the street. A group of people and at the front of them, standing tall in that red jacket she loves so much is Emma. 

\--

He runs.

Screw the pain in his ribs, forget the lungs protesting as his body automatically tries to draw in air, forget everything but the knowledge that he is finally so close to her again. All that matters is Emma is at the other end of the street. Emma who has seen him, who is now sprinting towards him in turn and he thinks in this moment he could fly. Brain chants her name over and over, an awed litany of love, of delight that his love - his true love? - is there.

Arms wrap around her as they collide, and not even the added pressure on his aching body can detract from the joy that fills every inch of him. He breathes in the scent of warm leather and pineapple shampoo that she likes to use, claims the tropical scent relaxes her. It is sharp and tangy and so very _her_. He feels like laughing and crying at the same time, emotions in a violent state of flux as he struggles to just believe that she is really here with him. Just as with his mother, he struggles to believe in any happy reunion. 

Killian feels her shudder against him, body shaking from all the repressed emotions she has fought for so long and so hard to contain. He can hear her mumbling against his chest, words pitched low, almost running into each other. At first he can’t make out what she is saying, but gradually he starts to make out the words that are still running into each other, a loop of muttered syllables one after another, over and over again. The ache of his heart should be a pain Killian is used to, but each blow feels like a brand new wound, her words unintentionally ripping him apart. 

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I’m sorry.”

“It's been a hell of a ride hasn't it,” Killian tells her sadly, hand lifting and brushing gently over her blond hair, marvelling at the warm gold of it. He hadn’t exactly been in his right mind the last time he had seen her and so hadn’t really taken the time to admire the classic look of his Swan once more. She is breathtaking, almost glowing and his heart surges with love as he stares at her. Emma looks up at him, the war still visible in her eyes and Killian shakes his head gently. 

“Later love. We'll talk later, I promise.” 

They need to talk and soon, Killian knows. They need to talk if there is any chance of passing this test they are in. More importantly they need to talk if there is any chance of getting them back home. Regardless of what happens to his soul, he is determined to make sure they escape at least. He will not have anyone else suffer on his account. Not anymore. All of that is in the future, is something he will worry about soon enough.

But just for this one second, Killian just wants to enjoy the feel of her in his arms, with neither of them filled with darkness and evil. How long has it been since he has been able to just hold her? The last embrace where they had just been able to enjoy each other without the darkness hanging over them.

_The moment where you thought she might finally be able to tell you she loves you, in the loft remember? But no, not your Swan. She can only express her feelings in moments of highest tension and certain death. Maybe that's what this is? One last goodbye and proclamation of love._

Doubts creep in despite himself, like rats creeping into a stronghold. Is that what this is? Just some last gasp determination to say she loved him because this is the end? An end that had to be on her terms, not his? 

(It’s hard to remain strong, remain confident when so much of his life has been betrayal and pain.)

He looks away, taking in the small group of people behind her. David, Snow, Regina, Robin, even Henry. They are all people he has wronged recently, people he has hurt and yet they all came with Emma on what he knows is a ridiculous quest that they only have a very slim chance of succeeding.

Killian can only guess their love for Emma outweighs their hate for him - he has no idea why Regina is here. So she can finally kick his ass for everything he put her through perhaps? He must have ruined her plans for getting even with him by dying.

(Guilt wars with anger towards the Charmings, the memory of their actions in Camelot like a festering sore on his mind.

He doesn't blame them for what he became - that fault lies with him, and him alone. Even now though, Killian cannot help but blame them a little for the events before. For letting their daughter down when she needed them the most. He knows the truth from the diner - it would have been different if one of them had been cut by Excalibur.

He feels all this and they still followed Emma down to the Underworld. It only makes him feel more guilty.)

They stand a few feet away, giving the newly reunited a degree of privacy and he appreciates that. It is so much more than he deserves. Finally, Killian pulls back, hand resting against her arm to look her in the face.

“Swan... you shouldn't have come here love. I'm dead,” he reminds her, trying to keep his voice low and gentle. She swallows a couple of times before replying, her words sounding a lot stronger and determined than his had been.

“Death cannot stop true love. All it can do is delay it for a while.”

He blinks a few times, able to pick up a familiar lilt to her voice, recognizing the intent behind the words if not the words themselves. Abruptly, he is reminded of a moment in Camelot, back when hope had tasted sweet in his mouth. 

(The words themselves make him want to sing and shout to the rooftops that she is proclaiming their love to be true, that she is willing to say that when there are other people near them. It’s a far cry from a whispered admission that she thought she would never see him again and have to face her feelings.)

“You’re quoting something aren’t you.” 

“Maybe. Guess you’ll have to come back home to find out.” Her smile is watery as she speaks, a knowing gleam in her eyes as she issues the challenge. His smile is a little softer, a little less certain. Killian isn’t sure what to make of her words, to have her quote such a treasured idea and then go back to teasing as a way to deflect away from any actual issues. 

Before he can think any further on those dark and depressing thoughts, Henry is suddenly there, arms wrapped around Killian’s waist, hugging him fiercely. Warmth sweeps through Killian, a warmth that is not purely down to the heat of a living body on his - strangely - corporal spirit. It's the warmth of knowing that despite the terrible things he has done to the lad, that there is still hope enough for him to be actually happy to see the pirate again.

It lasts for maybe a fraction of a second before that heat is gone again, the teenage giving a slightly embarrassed cough. Blushing sightly, Henry takes a step back, gaze directed towards the floor. 

“You gotta stop dying all the time man.”

A beat. And then;

“This doesn't mean I've forgiven you.”

“I know,” Killian replies honestly. It will take more than fair words and one over the top gesture to repair the damage the last six weeks have caused them all but the hug inspires hope. Maybe, just maybe, he will be up to the task.

\--

Milah is standing a little way from the group, looking a little awkward, a little sad. Its a look of the outsider watching a scene they desperately want to be a part of but feel they can’t. He has been the outsider for so long now, he knows what is is like to stand with your face pressed against the glass, staring longingly at the warmth inside, the picture you are not a part of. It hurts beyond all measure to want to reach in for that moment but to stand back, either unsure of your welcome or worse, know only too well that any attempt would be rebuffed.

It is not a fate he will allow to befall Milah. 

“There is... there is someone I’d like you to meet love,” Killian mummers, offering Milah what he hopes is a reassuring smile. She frowns, a tiny, fleeting thing, eyes flickering between him and Emma, clearly misunderstanding his intentions. Killian can’t say he blames her. He has been glued to Emma’s side since they had found each other again, almost ignoring his former lover and hating himself a little bit for each passing moment he had done so.

It’s not Emma he needs her to meet.

(He wants her to meet Swan of course - he wants her to approve of his True Love, wants her to know that he has found a different sort of peace, a different love but it hasn't altered his feelings towards her.

This isn't about what he wants.)

Killian gives her another smile as he takes Milah by the hand and slowly draws her forward, gesturing towards Henry with his hook. Milah’s smile shifts from the forced blandness of before to honest confusion as she stares at the teenager, no doubt wondering why, out of everyone, this is the person he wants her to meet first.

He is surprised she can't see it. Then again, it had taken Killian a while but now he sees Baelfire in almost every action and word, a frightening mix of Regina, Emma and Baelfire that has formed into the young man now before them.

There is silence aside from Emma’s soft intake of breath.

He glances over to her, seeking belated permission and it only just occurs to him that Swan might not want Milah to meet Henry. Her relationship with Baelfire is a wound Killian tries to avoid as best he can, respecting the past and not wanting to bring further pain to her. And he, in turn, hadn't wanted to think too hard about his own past, his failed relationship with Baelfire.

They had both loved and lost him, in their own ways.

He doesn't want to hurt Emma. Blue eyes meet green. She hesitates for a second, everything Killian is thinking clear on his face, the desire for Milah to meet Henry and the regret he hadn't thought it through. Emma blinks a few times before giving a slight, almost barely there nod.

Henry, bright lad that he is, has already worked it out, staring up at her in shock. Looking back, he can see Milah start to frown in puzzlement down at him, the cogs slowly turning in her mind, the longer she stares.

(What a family the lad has.)

Voice is choked with emotion - regret? Pride? Sorrow? He can't put a name to what he is feeling, but the negative ones don't seem to be correct. There is a sort of pain here, pain that this is how they have to meet but at the same time he is so happy that they have been given this chance at all.

“Milah... this is Henry. Your Grandson.”

She gasps, hand flying to her mouth and Killian can see the moment she gets it, the moment she looks and sees her own son shining within this lad. 

“Henry. Oh... oh look at you,” Milah whispers, hand lifting to reach for him. She pauses before actually making contact, unsure if such a thing would he welcome. Henry, it seems, has no such quarms, stepping forward to take her hand and press it against his cheek.

“Hello Grandma,” he whispers softly. She makes a sound in the back of her throat, something small and needy, before leaning down to brush a gentle kiss against his forehead. Henry is older than Baelfire had been, the last time she had seen him, but this is the closest he can give her to those lost moments they should have had.

“Thank you for giving me this chance to meet you Henry.” Words are soft but heartfelt, Milah looking more content than he thinks he has ever seen. They smile at each other, another piece of family reunited.

“Well, if we are done with all the touching moments, shall we get inside so we can make a plan? Finding the one handed wonder here was almost too easy, I doubt they will let us carry on being so lucky.” Regina’s grumblings lack the bite they normally would, almost as if the moment has affected her too and the idea makes Killian smile a little. He always knew she was a softie at heart.

(He didn't know. Like almost everyone else, he had simply assumed the Evil Queen had a heart of steel and stone. Killian should have known better than to believe the stories, even when she acted like them. People are always more than the titles they represent.)

Robin chuckles lightly, the archer seemingly no worse for ware after his imprisonment - another crime Killian must atone for - stepping forward to rest his hand on her arm, drawing her attention, the Queen instantly softening.

“Regina is right,” Snow said, looking around with slight nervousness. “We haven't faced any threat or dangers since meeting Hades. It's been too easy, especially after he laid down that challenge.”

“What challenge?” Killian asks, that warm, light feeling starting to drain away, a cold chill replacing it. This is the start of what Persephone was talking about, the test she was convinced they would fail and he still didn't know the details, what Swan had risked to save his useless hide.

“Later,” Emma replies, expression serious once more. 

Reluctantly, Killian nods, adding it to the list of things they need to talk about once they get inside and somewhere safe.

Milah makes another soft, choking sound, freezing in place. Eyes grow wide as she stands there, staring off into the nothingness.

“Milah?” Killian questioned with alarm. “What’s wrong?”

“I... I think I’m ready.” Milah says in awe, lifting her now glowing hands to stare at them, pure light dancing over her fingers. She looks up, meeting Killian’s gaze for a second before her eyes slide past him, staring over his shoulder in surprise.

“Ba... Baelfire?” 

He spins, squinting in the direction she is looking in but there is nothing there. Nothing at least, that he can see. Milah is still smiling, tears rolling down her face as she takes a few steps forward, arms lifting as if embracing someone he can't see. She shimmers a little in the light, and for a moment, he could have sworn she was made of starlight. Her head tilts a little to the side as she listens to air, willingly caught in this moment between states. Killian has to hope and believe that it really is Bae’s spirit she is seeing, come to guide her home.

“He says he loves you Henry, so much. That he is so proud he got to know you, even for a little while... and Killian?” Milah looks back at him fondly, the area around her now lit up with a warm white light. It is almost burning and yet for all that, Killian welcomes the heat, recognizing it somehow as a good type of pain. The type that brings relief instead of long lasting agony. He holds his breath as she smiles, something incandescent with joy and love. 

“He says he forgives you.”

\--

It is a bittersweet moment. 

On one hand, it is a victory, Milah passing over after being trapped in this area of the Underworld for so long. And for it to have happened so soon after the group had arrived here gives him hope that they might be able to win against the Gods afterall. On the other hand, he had just been reunited with his former love after centuries apart and now he was losing her all over again. It was different this time, but the pain is still acute.

Regina blinks a few times, staring off into space beyond Robin before she shakes herself back to the moment at hand. Her gaze seems to flicker around Milah and the rest of the group, as though unable to settle but Killian cannot bring himself to wonder what is going on in her mind right now. Not when he is getting to witness this.

Slowly, Killian exhales, trying to will some of the stress away. His arm slips around Emma as they stand there, Milah’s form rapidly fading as she walks away, going to the beyond, to whatever is waiting for them over the horizon. 

Emma shifts a little, turning into his chest, her head resting against his shoulder, so close she could hear his heart were it to start beating again.

(Out of love alone, he half believes it can.)

Killian tilts his head a little, brushing a kiss along the top of her hair, marvelling that he has been granted this second chance to do so. There is still so much between them and Storybrooke, 

But in this moment - well, he has to allow himself to enjoy the moments, as he constantly reminded Swan. This victory, watching Milah reach her well deserved eternal rest is one he needs to treasure, a memory he can pull out down the line to comfort himself. He may not have been able to avenge her death in the way he had sought to do for some long, but perhaps that doesn't matter. Perhaps she has never needed avenging like that but just the peace granted to her by knowing her son had lived a good life in its own way. In knowing her line has continued and something good, something wonderful in the shape of Henry has come out of everything.

Peace was better than blood. 

(He still won't be friends with the Crocodile, reluctant allies in the face of certain doom at best, but it may be time to let the past move on like Milah right now. To give up on trying to give him even if the opportunity presented itself.)

Emma tilts her head up slightly to look at him, a warm, confident smile on her face. Killian cannot help but return the expression, a swell of hope and pride battling in his chest. With Emma by his side, he knows there is nothing they have to fear, he has seen her do the impossible countless times before. 

He pushes aside all negative feelings, all self loathing and dark whispers of his worth and finally, lets himself just _believe_.

“We’re going home Killian, I promise. All of us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact. One of Persephone’s many other names is Kore. Which in modern times can also be spelt as Cora. I really wish I could have worked that into this story somehow but alas it was not to be. 
> 
> See! I can end chapters on nice cliffhangers too. Kudos and comments as always, feed my soul.


	8. Chapter Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Author's Notes:** Well, I guess I paid for that fast update last time by burning myself out a little on this story, hence the delay. I’ve also been going through some rough times, I had to put my cat to sleep. I’m so sorry for keeping you all waiting, it took a while before I could get back into it, but once I did, it started flowing so well I ended up having to split what was supposed to be the final Underworld chapter into two. So yeah... we’re increased chapter total again, hopefully for the last time. With that in mind, enjoy! Kudos and comments as always, feed the soul and encourage the muses.

## 

** Chapter Eight **

####  _**than this: where "I" does not exist, nor "you", - Pablo Neruda**_

__  
The glow of Milah passing safely on lasts as they walk along the street. It keeps him going as they climb the stairs to her parents apartment, apparently lovingly recreated in the Underworld, perhaps plucked from their souls by Hades. It keeps him going as the rest of the group shuffle off upstairs, granting the newly reunited couple the grace of privacy at last.

Then, he is alone with his Swan for the first time since his death and that warmth vanishes in an instant.

(He is grateful they didn’t go to their house. Too many mistakes happened there, too many ghosts of bad choices litter the landscape there for Killian to be able to be truly comfortable standing in that building when the ruins of what they had been are still littered around them.

Perhaps one day he will be able to look at that house with a less jaundiced eye. If they can create new, better memories there, it might be possible for Killian to think of the house and not associate it with nightmares.)

“So... I think we need to talk.” Killian says at last, voice unusually serious. Hand lifts to tug lightly at his ear as he speaks, a nervous habit he has never been able to shake. He can’t help but fall silent after that, mouth opening and closing a few times as he struggles to put some of his feelings into any kind of order, to find the right words for all the thoughts swirling madly in his head.

Where to begin? 

Emma wraps her arms around herself as if giving herself a hug and it takes all that Killian is, not to walk over there and embrace her. To just hold her and ignore everything else. They can patch up what they were by ignoring recent events. They won’t be stronger but they will exist together. That is the easy way but she deserves better than that. He... he thinks that maybe he deserves better than that too.

“Swan... love... What you did. What... I did. A lot has happened between us... I. I think it's best if mayb-”

“We need to work out how to get you out of here first,” she blurts out, interrupting his words, the panic clear in her green eyes. Killian sighs softly, breathing through his nose as he fights to keep himself calm. She is scared, that much is obvious. Scared he is going to what - break up with her? That he might decide she hurt him too much and that enough for enough? That he might want to follow Milah and pass on to the next great adventure, over that horizon? Emma doesn’t know that he has already turned down that chance, how he has already risked the wrath of the Gods and fought to get this far. 

He can’t help the small flicker of resentment that rises up in him, at knowing how little she truly thinks of him even now. 

Technically, Killian doesn’t know if they are even still together. A lot of bad blood has passed between them, a lot of nasty actions and words were thrown at each other. They had both of them, walked away from the other, had turned their backs when the other one needed them. They had broken, but had they broken apart? 

Maybe this is their chance to start anew but he can see Swan doesn’t see that. All she sees is the possibility that things are going to change out of her control and not on her own timeline. 

Some part of him wants to grab Emma and shake her almost, in a bid to make her see sense. They can’t keep dancing around the subject like this, eventually one of them will trip and fall - again. He knows that she can’t keep running away from her problems, that was the root cause of a lot of the issues they now but as always, Killian feels himself crumble a little under the look she is giving him, as weak and as helpless as the first time she looked at him with those eyes. Forget Persephone and her power, Emma Swan’s eyes are the ones to pledge allegiance to. 

This isn’t the time to face her with these truths. 

(Some part of him wonders when will be the time? When will he work up the nerve to finally insist they sit down and have the conversation that could destroy their happiness? He just needs to convince his traitorous heart that it is worth the risk, that this middle ground they are wading through is toxic and they could climb to such great heights if only they take the chance.)

“Fine.” Word is clipped, almost cold as he holds back his frustration and he can see her shrink further into herself at his tone, a faint wave of regret rolling through him at the sight.

Killian refuses to allow his feelings to blossom into guilt. 

He... he does have every right to feel this way. He thinks. He hopes. It doesn’t change how much he loves Swan and why can’t they just talk about this? 

“So what was the deal you made with them? What do we have to do?” Killian asks after a short pause, looking everywhere but at the woman he loves more than anything else in the world. He hears her sigh softly and can imagine the way she relaxes slightly at knowing they have avoided the other subject.

For now. He is not done with this, no matter how many times she gives him that look. 

“He said... to win we will have to lose. And that we’ve already made all the choices. That I’ve done what needs to be done to save you but you need to know what it is. To pass the test we must lose and you need to know.”

“That's the test? I need to know what you did? What did you do?” This all sounds far too easy, and while Killian would like something to be easy just once, he highly doubts Hades would let them get away with that. There is no entertainment for the Gods if it is too easy. He tilts his head after a few moments of silence, confused as to why Emma hasn’t answered, Killian finally meeting her gaze again.

She gives him a helpless look and his heart sinks lower.

“I have no idea.”

\--

Somewhere along the way, day seems to have shifted into night. Funny, to think that the Underworld might have a day and night cycle, that it might follow such basic patterns but he supposes the Gods would have copied it as they copied everything else in this little hellhole of a town they had made. Everything is just a little off, the details betraying the fact that neither Hades nor Persephone seem to fully understand the mortal world. 

There are no stars in the sky for example, just a dark blue nothingness that threatens to swallow them whole, Killian staring out at it long after Swan has announced she is going to try and get some sleep. The Gods are well aware of stars, he knows, which makes the absence here all the more troubling. Of course, most stars come with tales of the people they had once been so perhaps they are not here because of the stories. Or maybe it is simply because they knew Killian would look, would search for his lodestar in the night sky in an attempt to find some support and meaning. 

He is truly adrift now, with even Emma unable to guide him.

All the awkwardness has returned since their conversation. It is as bad as the worst days when she was the Dark One and he was adrift, lost without his memories and unaware of the hurt he had inflicted. They are separated again, in mind, if not physically. 

Killian doesn’t know how to reach across that chasm to take her by the hand.

(Yes he does. He’s always known, but it requires a courage he doesn’t know if he possesses.)

Eventually, the night looses what little appeal it had and he withdraws, going in search of Swan and hopefully some sleep of his own.

The Charmings’ home isn’t a _perfect_ replica, he has discovered. It seems to stretch and warp space, bending around itself to create certain rooms a number of times over. Such as bedrooms, one for each pair and then another on top of that for Henry. It’s as though the Underworld is reacting to their presence and trying to make things comfortable, as strange as the idea might seem. Even Regina appears to have decided the rooms are no cause for concern, Killian passing one with her curled up on the bed. Her body twitches a little, a small, jerking motion of apparent distress. Next to her, Robin reaches out, running a hand along her side and she stills. Just for a moment. Then the twitching begins again.

Killian pauses for a second to stare at her, the tiny motions pulling at some distant memory in his mind. It feels as though something else is going on here, something else that he can’t quite grasp and yet at the same time, he should already know. He shakes his head a little, the moment passing as soon as it began. Whatever strangeness is going on with Regina this time, he is sure Robin can handle it. He has more important things to be worrying about right now as he resumes his search for Emma. 

Swan has settled into one of the bedrooms, already asleep. Killian hesitates for a few long seconds, standing the darkened doorway to just watch her. He cannot help but feel he is intruding on somewhere that he has no right to be. How arrogant of him, to assume that she would want him in her room, in her bed after everything that has happened. Killian doesn’t know where be belongs anymore and while his heart cries out to belong with her, he doesn’t know if he is welcome. If there is a place for him. It's foolish considering she came down here after him, but all the doubts and self loathing of hundreds of years are not so easily unlearnt. 

She turns a little in the bed, shifting as though to get comfortable. It is enough to shake Killian out of his thoughts, snapping him back to the here and now. He shouldn’t disturb her, not when she is finally getting some much needed sleep. He would only be a bother. 

(Lying to himself is something else he needs to unlearn.)

Green eyes blink slowly at him, and for a second he thinks his internal thoughts have woken her. She always did say he thought too hard. More than ever, Killian knows he should let her get some peace but he cannot move when she is staring across the room at him. Silent yet open in a way she so rarely is. Sleep has lowered many of her walls, crumbled the brickwork down and she forgets to be guarded, forgets that she has to put on a strong face and act as though nothing is touching her. 

Emma is always beautiful. But he thinks, perhaps, she is most beautiful like this. When she’s too tired to hide, or when she is brave enough to forget to be strong. 

“Come here,” she mutters, voice thick with sleep. One hand lifts groggily, pushing back the pale lilac coloured covers in invitation. “Come to bed Killian.” 

Well, he can hardly walk away now. Quietly, he heads towards the bed, shrugging out of the leather jacket as he goes. Carefully, he folds the garment and drapes it over the back of the nearby chair. It brushes against the red leather of her own jacket and something small and warm blossoms in his chest at the sight of them side by side again. Its sentimental perhaps, but there had been a time when he had worried he was never going to see her in that jacket again, with everything it represented. 

Faint smile twitches on his face as he turns back to the bed, Emma still blinking sleepily up at him. She is still mostly clothed and he understands why. They are naked enough as it is here, they don’t want to make themselves even more vulnerable. He doesn’t bother to remove any other clothing bar his shoes, pushing them neatly under the bed before climbing in. She sighs softly in contentment, blanket dropping over them both, her body seeking out his own.

“You’re cold,” Emma mumbles, slurring the words slightly. He feels a twitch in his jaw at her words, a tiny tick of discomfort that he attempts to swallow as best he can. She is half asleep and she isn’t thinking about what she is saying, she doesn’t mean anything by her words. He knows this. He _knows this_. But he also already knows that he is cold, that it isn’t a problem some blankets could solve. He is always going to be cold now. 

Because of course he’s cold. He’s dead. By all logic, she should reach out for him and instead reach through him. He is little more than a spirit, a ghost. The lingering after thoughts of the once was, still clinging grimly to a reality that didn’t include him anymore. 

He shouldn’t be here.

No. She shouldn’t be here. This, is exactly where he belongs. This and somewhere worse. 

Like an old friend, he welcomes the self hate back, letting it settle around his shoulders. It weighs down on him, but then again, Killian is so used to that weight by this point, that it actually feels normal to feel that. Which he knows - oh the list of things that he _knows_ \- isn’t actually normal. He breathes in. Holds it for eight seconds. Breathes back out. Blue eyes drop to stare at the blond pressed by his side. 

Somehow, she has managed to fall asleep and Killian cannot help but feel so jealous of that. Sleep tries to beckon him in turn, warring with the anxious thoughts running through his mind, all the maybes and could have, should have. He feels tired but everytime he closes his eyes, memories of the recent past assault him. All the terrible things he had done. It was yet another punishment, the lack of sleep, his hideous crimes playing out in glorious Technicolor behind his eyelids.

By his side, Emma slumbers peacefully, her warmth a reassuring heat that tells him at least this is real. This is his reality. Despite everything he did, she is not giving up on him. 

But after hours of lying there, torturing himself mentally, he has to admit, he needs to give up on sleep. Tonight at least.

Admitting defeat, Killian starts to carefully ease out of the bed, doing his best not to disturb her. After everything that has happened, she needs rest as much as anything else, her body recovering and coming down from the high of being fuelled purely by magic for weeks. It amazes him that she hasn’t already completely crashed as it worked its way out of her system. Perhaps her own magic, while completely opposite to the darkness that had leached its way into her very blood, was keeping her somewhat stable and letting her come gentle down from the high. 

He can only assume being dead is what is keeping him from getting the shakes or wanting to feel that magic in his blood once more. It is more an abstract thing, something he knows he should feel but doesn’t. As if it was a desire from long ago, dulled by time and distance. Hand runs through his hair as he makes his way down the corridor. Killian isn't sure what he is going to do exactly, perhaps see if he can drink coffee in this state - who knows if there is even coffee here. Do the living need to eat down here? 

(For that matter, does it work the same way as Persephone’s pomegranate seeds?

Well. He really isn’t getting any sleep now. That is a no to the coffee, and an added push to make sure they get out of the Underworld as quickly as possible. Perhaps he should hide any food just to be on the safe side.) 

He makes his way to the living room, only to find that he isn’t the only one having trouble sleeping tonight. Robin Hood is settled on the couch, bow on his lap. He is doing something to the weapon, a rag held loosely in one hand although he isn’t moving, head tilted to watch the door. It seems as though Killian had not been as quiet as he had thought and for a moment he hesitates in the doorway, unsure of his welcome here. The last time they had been alone, it hadn’t gone well for the archer. 

“Hey.” The greeting might be lacking in words but there is still warmth in those three letters, as if the sight of Killian doesn't make a blood lust rise in him. It is so much more than he knows he deserves. He wants to make amends. Robin isn't the only one he has hurt, not by a long shot but Robin is the only one here right now and so as good a place as any to start.

“I, uh... I’m sorry,” Killian says at last, meaning so much more than simply interrupting Robin and distracting him from his task. He doesn't think there are enough hours in the day for all the things that he is sorry about.

“Don’t worry about it,” Robin replies easily, offering him a smile that the pirate knows wholeheartedly he does not deserve. As though it is that simple, as if forgiveness can simply be handed over to him without any effort. Killian feels his mouth drop open a little in shock. As much as he wants to leave it there, to take the words and just accept them, he knows he can't. He wants to shake Robin as well, to demand the man make him suffer, to punish him for everything he did.

“How can you stand to even have a conversation with me Robin?” The guilt has been eating away at Killian for hours now, ever since he saw that the archer had risked everything to come down here after him.

“Why are you even here after everything I did to you?” He still doesn’t understand and Killian is so _sick_ of not understanding. The ground is constantly shifting under his feet and he feels as though he has to do a constant dance just to keep himself upright. Robin shrugs a little, leaning forward, bow placed carefully to the side, all his attention now fully focused on Killian. He wants to shrink away from the gaze, suddenly afraid of what was going to be said next.

“Because I never got the chance to thank you.” 

Killian... blinks. Out of everything he could have possibly said, everything that Killian knows he deserves, this is not one of them. He can’t help the disbelieving snort that slips from his lips and what on earth can Robin be hoping to achieve by such blatant lies?

“No, thank you, Killian. I mean it,” Robin adds, and his tone is so earnest, so serious. It is begging to be believed and despite himself, despite everything, Killian finds himself wanting to do just that. The faintest flicker of hope starts to burn in his chest, kindled by Robin’s words. It is enough to make him move further into the room to sit on the nearby chair, leaning forward to listen, his pose as intent as Robin’s own.

“Yeah, what you did was wrong, don’t misunderstand me. You were the Dark One after all, you wanted to cause all manner of hell,” Robin began and Killian almost welcomes the pain the words cause, the tiny lashes against his soul. Punishment to fit the crime is something he understands, something he can work with. Despite that however, despite the negative words there is something wrong with the tone, something stopping him from bathing deeply in his own pain. There is no bite to these words, no angry intent and so the pain is fleeting at best.

“You could have given me to Zelena, you could have let me die, you could have tortured me just because you wanted to, because the darkness would have found it funny and I know it would have been whispering at you to do those things and more.”

“Well yes, but I still-”

“Still, nothing mate,” Robin insists, an intent look on his face. “Listen to me. I don’t blame you for what you did when you were the Dark One, it is as simple as that. Because you Killian Jones, are a good man under it all and I forgive you.”

Killian does not know what he has done to deserve such friendship, such forgiveness. He knows he doesn't deserve it really and that he shouldn't accept it. But oh, how he wants to. Mouth opens to reply, still unsure if he is going to accept or decline it when the sound of footsteps distracts him, head turning a little to see who is coming.

“What’s going on?” A slightly disheveled David wanders into the room, hand lifting to mask the yawn the escaped as he spoke.

“Sorry for waking you mate,” Killian apologises, and his life is full of committing crimes and then saying sorry for them after.

“Nah, its fine,” David replies, waving away the apology with an easy wave of that same hand. He gives another yawn, still looking more asleep than awake. “I was going to be getting up soon anyway. What were you talking about?” 

He can't decide if David is being nosey, suspicious of his intentions or just trying to be friendly. Knowing the man, it is probably a subconscious mix of the three.

“Guys! I can’t find Killi- oh. There you are.” Emma is hot on her father's heels, bursting into the living room, panic written large on her features. Guilt coils once more in the pit of his stomach, at knowing she would have woken up alone. Gods what must that have been like for her? Thinking that it might have been a dream, that he was really gone.

She relaxes a fraction at the sight of him, before father and daughter are talking over each other, asking and answering questions. It's way too early for this kind of noise, for the energy that the Charming family produce. Neither notice the way Robin stands and takes a few steps towards the entrance, head tilted to the side as he goes. Killian notices however, letting his focus narrow down on him and not the now bickering pair behind them as he too stands to try and work out what it is that the thief has sensed.

Robin holds up a hand, a gesture for silence as he stares intently at the front door. Somehow, a hand is enough to silence the others, a stillness descending on the group without any snide remarks or witty comebacks.

(He is going to have to have Robin teach him that trick.)

Now that everyone has stopped talking, Killian can hear what the archer had picked up on too. A faint scrap of metal against metal, as though someone is trying to pick the lock to get in. Robin inches closer to the door, David and Killian a few steps behind. Closer and closer, and he is convinced now that it really is someone trying to gain entry. 

But who? Hades and Persephone hardly seem to type to be stopped or bothered by a lock on the door and surely nobody else even knows they are here? Perhaps an old friend of his, someone who has heard Captain Hook has finally made his final journey and is here to settle some very old scores. He can't imagine its anything good on the other side of that door. Robin very slowly lifts his bow, hand inching towards an arrow as he prepares for whatever is going to come through the entrance.

It's all very quiet, very slow, the sound of breathing and the scrape of metal filling the room. Too quiet for his Swan it seems, too slow and she has never liked letting someone else set any kind of pace. Emma lets out a huff and storms forward, grabbing the lock and twisting it roughly. He has to admit, whoever is on the other side is unlikely to be expecting that.

Door swings violently open, the person on the other side wobbling slightly. With a startled yelp, a curly haired man falls through the door from where he is kneeling against it, landing in front of the three men, head slightly bowed. A hand is pressed against the ground, supporting his weight and for a few moments the man simply remains there, where he has fallen.

Something in Killian’s chest falls as well. Time seems to have stopped, and he is caught in this frozen bubble of a moment. He isn't sure how long it lasts for, this weird, suspended moment in time, when all he can do is stare at the stranger in front of them, while that leaden weight in his chest sinks lower and lower.

Finally though, the stranger looks up. No. Not a stranger. Not by a long shot.

“Liam...” Name slips out through numbed lips and Killian had known he might be here of course, had been tormented by the idea, by the fact that two of the paths he could have taken were real, so why not the third? He had hoped with everything he was, that the image of Liam had been an illusion and yet here he was, in the flesh so to speak.

The man - his _brother_ \- grins, a quick and easy smile, full of the brother Jones famous family charm.

(Later, he will realise that smile was a little too quick, too casual. Later, he will look back and kick himself for not noticing how fake it actually was, how insincere.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing.)

“Little brother! It _is_ you. I could hardly believe the news.” Liam pushes himself back to his feet, ignoring the rest of the group. 

“Younger brother.” The rejoinder slips out before Killian can think about it, and it sends a wave of pain through him. He supposes, technically, he isn’t the younger brother any more. He got to live his own, long life, and then Liam’s years on top of it. And the years of every soul he had lead to their doom. Perhaps not literally, he hadn’t stolen their years to extend his own life but it certainly felt as though he lived because they had died.

Nobody should have lived as long as he had. 

“Killian, it’s wonderful to see you.” Liam steps forward, enveloping him in a hug, chasing away the dark thoughts for now. Like Killian, he is cold to the touch. Yet despite it all, the hug has a warmth to it, a comfort born of family. He had never expected so many reunions after dying, never dreamed he would be blessed with so much joy in a place he was supposed to be punished in.

“Um. Hello? Liam, is it?” Emma’s voice breaks through the haze the hug has created, Killian suddenly aware of everyone else around them. Emma is standing with her hands in her hips, staring at Liam with what he registers to be suspicion on her face. She must know this is the Liam, they had both been obvious about the titles and claims each had upon the other. And yet she speaks in a tone Killian knows only too well, one that shows she does not trust the person she is speaking to. He has heard her use that voice on him after all.

He supposes she is entitled to answers. Liam was trying to break into the apartment instead of just knocking like a regular person but this is his brother. His brother. He is sure Liam has a good reason for having acted as he had. They just need to give him the chance to explain himself, not act as though he was the enemy.

The temperature seems to physically drop in the room by a noticeable amount as Liam turns a little to stare at Emma.

Killian isn’t sure what to make of this because he’s seen a lot of emotions from Liam and although the memories are faded leaves on a page, they are still there. He’s seen him exasperated, scared, angry, determined. He’s seen sorrow and joy, seen him tired, seen him push past his limits for the good of the crew. All of that and more. He has never seen such naked rage on his brother before, the emotion transforming his features into some kind of unrecognizable being.

“Hades told me all about you. About what you did to Killian.” Words are snarled, Liam taking a menaching step towards Emma, David instantly moving between them. The tension in the room racks up another few inches and Killian has been in enough fights over the years to know this has the potential to get very ugly, very quickly. Eyes meet Robin’s, a silent conversation passing between them in a matter of moments. As much as it pains him, he can see that the two most important people in his life are not getting on and they need help. Nodding slightly, Robin starts to ease his way backwards, intent on waking Snow and the others. Hopefully the added people will defuse the situation.

Anger is practically radiating off his brother and it is all Killian can do to stare at him in a little awe. Some part of him has missed this. He might not be a little boy anymore but some part of him can’t help but enjoy the image of his older brother protecting him, despite not needing it anymore. 

“About what I... I did what I did to save him!” Emma spluttered, her hands curling into fists.

“Really? To save him?” Liam gives a snort as he speaks, completely unimpressed by her words. Lips curl into a sneer as he takes another step towards the blond. “Was that before or after you stabbed him with a sword of complete darkness?”

“Liam!” Enjoying his brother trying to defend him or not, this has gone on far enough. Liam doesn’t know enough about what had happened to be able to speak like that. He has to wonder, what exactly Hades has told him. It’s part of the story at least, the way he had died even if Liam didn’t seem to know how Killian had begged her to do just that.

For that matter, why has Hades shared any of this in the first place? What does he hope to gain from all of this? This has to be part of the test, of the plan to thwart Emma’s attempt to save him. Killian hates the thought that his brother is being used as a pawn in someone else's evil scheme. He has to get them to calm down so they can work out what is going on. Liam shakes his head, the frustration evident on his face.

“No, she dragged your death out for weeks, she made you suffer, made everyone you care about suffer because she was too selfish, too blind to listen.”

“I didn't know that would happen.” Emma replied, still trying to defend herself, tone growing increasingly sharp. Liam laughs, sound full of malice and ill humour.

“What in the blazes did you think _would_ happen? You fill my little brother to the brim with pure darkness and he would realise his own views and desires didn't matter? That he was wrong to not want it, to have rather died than become the thing he has hated more than anything else in any of the realms?” 

They are standing almost toe to toe now, and even David has been pushed to the side, helpless in the face of such ornate hostility from both of them. 

“You are not worthy of him, you act like you care but you are just as bad as the rest!” Liam all but shouts.

“How dare you! I love him! I was trying to save his life! I came down here to save him!”

“You call that living?! You enslaved him to the very thing he has spent multiple life times trying to destroy. After he begged you not to!”

“It was temporarily! It was just until I had worked up a way to save him, it was worth it to buy us the time we needed to be able to save him. I didn't plan for any of this to happen. He wasn't supposed to end up like this.” Emma seems close to tears by this point, but Killian is too busy reeling from her words to really notice. Worth it.

It was _worth it_? After everything, she still thought it was worth it?

“He grew up as a slave so don’t you dare claim it was just temporary to save him. We know what it feels like to have those chains wrapped around our necks, it is never worth it.” Liam’s voice has dropped into a low hiss but despite that his words carry, the whole room going silent as a gasp sounds from the stairs, Snow suddenly standing there.

“What?” Emma’s voice has dropped too, as if she has forgotten she is angry, wide green eyes turning to look at Killian in shock.

No. Please. Not that. Not that past, that truth. Not here, not now.

(Not ever. If he had had his way, he would never have shared such a wound. They all of them have scars they would rather keep hidden and it is not selfish to want to hold that one truth to his chest where nobody can see it, nobody can hurt him with it.)

“Liam. Don’t.” Killian hates that he is begging but he can’t stand this, he can’t stand the idea that they might find out all the sordid details of his past. 

“No brother. She needs to know, they all need to know. She just chained you to darkness even after you begged her not to and she still doesn’t get it!” He gives a snort and shake of his head.

“She still thinks ignoring your wishes and violating you was worth it.” 

Liam twists suddenly away from Emma and storms out of the building.

After a moment of hesitation, Killian follows, ignoring the cries from Emma to come back.

\--

Liam strides down the road with a clarity of purpose that Killian has always envied. 

“How do you even know your way around?” Killian complains, once he has finally caught up with him. The pace is brisk, determined and it doesn't take him long to realise they are heading for The Rabbit Hole - or heading nowhere and Liam is just acting as though he has any idea where he is going. “You never came to Storybrooke.”

“It's in my head,” Liam replied, almost absently, finger tapping at his forehead, never once breaking his purposeful stride. “When Hades created this version of... Storybrooke did you say it was called? When he made this town, he filled our heads with the information to be able to move around in it. This isn't the first time he's done this after all.”

Killian remained silent, mulling over the words. So this was how Hades and his wife passed the time, testing souls and getting the rest to play along with the sick little games, creating whole little worlds. It's enough to keep him distracted the rest of the walk as they do indeed make their way to The Rabbit Hole.

Liam surprises him yet again by fetching two rums without a word, pushing one of the drinks towards his brother. He picks up the glass, swirling the rich amber liquid inside and staring intently down into it as though it could somehow answer all the questions that are swirling in turn in his head. Killian knows he has to start somewhere, and there was one question that was niggling at the forefront of his mind, gaze lifting from his drink to look across the table at his brother.

“Why were you trying to break in anyway?” Killian asks, no anger or frustration in his voice, just simple curiosity. He knows there has to be a good reason for Liam doing what he has done. He believes in him, a bright and simple faith. 

“I wanted to talk to you without that siren knowing about it and messing with your thoughts. She's dangerous Killian, surely you see that?” Liam takes a swig of his rum, a little more force in the motion than was perhaps strictly necessary. 

“You’re comparing Swan to a siren? Really? What in all the hells did Hades fill your head with brother?” 

“Oh so she didn’t mess with your heart for months, leading you on a merry dance, telling you to be patient while she moved things at her own glacial pace? She did notice when you were heartless and controlled by your worst enemy? She didn’t say ‘I love you’ for the first time ever because she thought she would never have to see you again and deal with that? She didn’t turn you into a Dark One? She didn’t kill you?” Liam seems to suddenly run out of steam, a soft sigh escaping from him while all Killian can do is scramble for some kind of justification, some explanation. Yes, everything he had said was true, but it all sounded so... _bad_ when it was put like that. As if all the good moments were wiped away and nothing of them remained.

“I begged her to use the sword.” It seems the most important thing to focus on right now, and he needs Liam to understand how he got here. How he had become a monster, a conduit of dark and had needed to destroy himself before he destroyed the world. 

“Because of what she had turned you into! You were always a self sacrificing moron, I’m impressed but how those souls you conjured up didn’t realise what you would do is beyond me. It's the sort of thing you were annoyingly good at. And not holding your drink, although I hear you have improved in that at least. A little too much perhaps...” 

This, at least, is more familiar. Disapproval, Liam disappointed in his weakness, in his life choices and where they have led him. He is amazed it has taken him this long to be honest, and that he hasn’t mentioned the Hook, or all the terrible crimes he commited. 

“You can’t go with these people Killian! You can’t risk your soul in some reckless attempt to somehow come back from the dead, I won’t let you throw yourself away like that,” Liam tells him, the frustration clear to see and it comes out as an order more than anything else. Captain Liam Jones trying to pull his wayward brother back in line. Only he isn’t that Leftenant anymore and Liam has not been his Captain for so long. 

Killian can feel a little of that frustration rise in him himself. Yes, Liam had hardly seen Emma at her best, both with what he has been told and the brief argument he had taken part in but that isn't all they are. A couple of moments do not define them. Emma’s actions, as wrong as they still feel to him, and as right as they might seem to her - which hurts - do not define them.

He loves her and he's going to fight for her, for them. 

“The truth is being twisted by Hades, Liam. Yes, Swan did those things and yes, I wasn’t exactly perfect myself but relationships aren’t perfect. People aren’t perfect. We fell a lot but we flew even more. I’m just as stubborn as she is and we will get there. We just... need to talk about it.” It’s a good thing he is as stubborn as his Swan, because he knows she will fight him on that. But eventually, they will talk. They have to. 

Even now though, even after all this, he believes in Liam. 

(How do you choose between different types of True Love? A son trumps a lover, Killian has always known that and respected it with his Swan. But how do a brother and lover compare? Especially when one is already dead.)

“Swan believes it can work and I believe in her Liam.” Words are simple, spoken from the heart and things are starting to make sense now. He will speak to her, he will demand she listen and accept how he feels. He will even try to accept her own feelings in return. 

“I'm willing to take that risk, and besides it isn't as though I have any other options,” Killian adds. Liam shakes his head, a gleam in his eyes.

“Relax Killian, I spoke to Hades about you, he is willing to let you pass on, let us both pass on. It turns out he can be a reasonable God.”

“You... made a deal with Hades?” Killian asks, voice sounding impossibly small to his own ears.

(Funny, how betrayal tastes as bitter on his lips as the first time. Funny, how even after all this time, there is yet more innocence to be ripped from him. Funny, how he never ever sees it coming. Not once.)

Liam pauses, as though Killian’s words and tone have finally made him realise he needs to be more careful with how he words this, that his brother isn't just going to blindly follow him anymore. Things change and as much as it pains him to think it, that naivety is gone forever. He cannot just blindly follow any more. Not his brother, not his Swan.

(It feels like he has surfaced after an eternity under the water, head breaking back into air. He can breathe again as the knowledge fills him like oxygen - he will go back with Emma, he will follow her. But on his terms this time. Not hers.)

“It was to save you! He’s willing to give you a second chance, do you know how rare that is? I don’t know of any other soul that has ever been given the opportunity to be allowed to pass on after they had rejected it. It's time to rest brother. Surely you can see that?”

How many times has he heard that? Someone claiming to love him, only to dictate terms on how he must live his life because of it. Someone justifying what they were doing by love. He has spent centuries justifying terrible deeds for a good reasons after all. He knows the script, better than Liam. He knows how the story ends, how it always ends.

“And you say Emma doesn’t understand...” Killian eyes the drink in his hand for a moment longer before carefully pushing it back across the table, rejecting it and so much more besides.

“Killian... I needed to protect you little brother.” Liam tells him, tone injured.

“Not like this!” Killian snaps, standing once more. “Never like this. I'm not giving up on Swan, and I certainly don't trust Hades, this is all part of his games. Its my life Liam and I need to do this.”

He also needs to clear his head, let his mind settle after all this new information and thoughts have come to light. He needs to make the choice to step away from both of the people he loves. Just for a moment. Just a single moment where he isn't compelled by outward forces or pushed into leaping one way or the other. He is finding his own quiet moment and taking it. On his own.

\--

He wanders without a destination in mind. His feet take him to the dock and the sight of the sea beyond it. Because of course they do. 

There is no Jolly Roger in sight and Killian supposes that makes sense. His beloved girl is not just a home, she is almost a living creature in her own right and so it makes sense that they would not have been able to recreate her.

When she dies, will she end up here too? A ghost ship sailing the rivers of the Underworld for all of time? 

He breathes in deeply, pushing such thoughts away. The air smells all wrong, there is no scent of salt, no hint of the sea, the waves do not rise and fall as they should. It might look as though the horizon stretches out beyond him but he knows it is just another lie of this place. There is no comfort to be found here. He searches for it anyway, trying to find something he can use in the sea that is a shade too green to be normal, that is missing any trace of life. What he wouldn’t give to see some sign of life.

Killian needs to really learn to be more careful what he wishes for. 

Time has passed in a blur, a mess of thoughts that do little to uncoil his mind. It feels as though he has been standing here forever and at same time it feels like he has done little more than breathe out before a shadow appears next to him, someone come to talk to him. Killian closes his eyes for a moment, not even daring to look to the side to see who it is as he fights to regain his strength.

(The fact is, the shadow could be so many people, that there are enough people willing to look for him, to talk to him. It no longer a case of one person and one person alone. And even then, never really being sure if Emma loves him as much as he loves her. She loves him true, he knows this now. She proved it to the point of destruction.

But it isn't Emma that has come looking for him. It's someone else, someone male from the brief glimpse he had gotten of the silhouette. Someone who cared enough to either make a deal with a God to try and save him - if it's Liam - or who marched straight down to the Underworld to get him back - after the conversation he's had with Robin he can no longer entertain the idea they had all come down here purely for Emma’s sake and not his own.

Gods, these idiots care for him don't they.

He has no clue how to handle that.)

“Killian. Can we talk?”

David. Killian supposes his shouldn't be surprised. Robin and he have already had their heart to heart, whereas he has yet to properly speak to either Charming. It's not a conversation he is looking forward to having, to have to endure insults and the simple fact that he had tried to hurt them all. 

Before, he would have welcomed it, welcomed and accepted the pain as his due.

With his new ideas floating around in his mind, it feels as though this conversation could tear down those fragile feelings. Killian doesn't want to talk to David, but he cannot run away from the words and more importantly, his own actions.

“Sure. What did you want to talk about?” Blue eyes open once more as he turns his head to look toward the man he had once hoped to call his friend. 

“What your brother said...” David begins, tone surprisingly hesitant, unsure of his footing it seems. 

Killian sighs darkly and he knew this conversation was coming. He has known since the moment Liam opened his mouth and told them, that at least one would come demanding answers about his past, would want to know why he hadn't shared his deep, dark secrets. As though they had any right to demand he share no matter how much it might hurt.

“Yes. What my brother said was the truth. We were slaves, and then eventually, we were not. And I would have rather died than go back to that but it wasn’t my choice to make in the end, it seems,” Killian told him sternly, knowing as he does that it will not be enough to stop a Charming when one of them gets going.

“Sorry,” David replied, and he actually sounds it as well, a sheepish expression on his face. “That... that wasn't what I even wanted to talk to you about.”

“It wasn't?” Now, that, does surprise Killian. He had expected more push from David, more demanding. He had thought all the painful details would be dragged out of him despite himself. It was the kind of behaviour he has come to expect from them but it is nice, for once, to be wrong. David crosses his arms over his chest, shifting uncomfortably from one leg to another.

“I... I was wrong.”

“I’m sorry?” Although the words are spoken glibly, in reality Killian feels anything but relaxed. He leans forward a fraction, cupping his hand behind his ear as if to hear him better. 

David, if possible, manages to look even more uncomfortable, which is quite a feat considering he had originally looked two seconds from bolting back down the road.

“I said I was wrong okay?” David repeated and no, it made as little sense now as it did the first time he had heard it. Killian tilts his head to the side, eyebrow cocked and he needs more from the Prince right now, he needs to understand what is being offered here. David sigs heavily and lifts a hand to shade his eyes, staring out at the unnatural horizon.

“In... in Camelot. You were right. If Snow had been the one cut, I would have moved heaven and earth to find a cure for her and if it had come down to it, I would have begged Emma to use her magic, just as she had done for you.”

The words are ones he has longed to hear for so long. He had been driven by more than mere vengeance, it had been spite as well, the bitterness of being overlooked, underestimated and otherwise ignored. Killian had imagined forcing the words from David before killing him. He had pictured the satisfaction he would feel when the other man finally admitted the truth, the joy he would feel of being proved right.

He doesn't get any enjoyment out of them. Not now.

“I was so quick to mistrust you again, I just jumped on the idea of you becoming Dark without ever even considering the man I know.”

That... that stings a little, in all honesty. To realise that David and Snow think so little of him and were so quick to forget everything he had done for them. He tries to smile, acutely aware that it must look more like a grimace than anything else. Just because it hurts, doesn't mean he has to let David know it hurts.

“It's okay Dave, I get it. I'm the Pirate, I'm a bad guy, of course you were going to think I was going to go evil. And I did, so...” Killian shrugs, trying to keep his tone light.

“But that's just it Killian,” David replies and he has that same intent, almost pleading look on his face, the same one Robin had shown him. “You aren't the bad guy, you haven't been the bad guy for a long time now. It wasn't worthy of me, to have... forgotten who you are so quickly. For God's sake Killian, we are supposed to be friends and I forgot that. If I had supported you, instead of just abandoning you to the darkness...” he trails off, a miserable expression on his face.

“I would have still given in to the Dark,” Killian tells him fimly and David might have messed up but he can't let him take all the blame. “Don't misunderstand me Dave, the Darkness is seductive, forever whispering in the back of your mind. I would have lost the fight sooner or later, everyone would have lost.”

“I - we - should have still supported you,” David replies and well, Killian can't really argue with that. “It's late, I know, but I hope not too late? I have your back Killian.”

Eyes widen in shock at the words and he had thought David admitting he was wrong was the height of his surprise. But now he was saying... he was saying he wanted to support him?

“Are you saying you like me?” Killian cannot help the teasing tone, needing to lighten the mood somewhat. David meets his gaze, eyes still slightly shaded but there is a frankness there.

“Aye mate.” There is nothing joking about him, even as he copies Killian’s turn of phrase. “I like you, and maybe once we get out of here, I will ask if you can forgive me.”

“No need to wait. Or ask.” Killian takes the few steps needed to close the distance between them, arms outstretched. This hug is different from the ones he has experienced recently - perhaps because he is the one to start it. He gives David a pat on the back as they pull apart again, fixing the man a stern glance.

“I forgive you mate.”

(How strange it is, to be the one saying those words instead of hoping to hear them. They taste funny in his mouth, as though they don't quite belong.)

“Let's go find the others okay?”

\--

Finding the others turns out to be easy enough since they haven't left the loft. Killian doesn't know how Snow has managed to convince Emma to just wait for them to come back, how she talked her down from just doing her own thing regardless.

Considering the way she is almost vibrating on the sofa or the way she all but flings herself on Killian the second they walk through the door, he has to think whatever it was, wouldn't have lasted much longer. She clings to him tightly, arms wrapped around him, her head buried against his shoulder. It's a surprisingly vulnerable look for his Swan. 

They stand like that for a few minutes, unspoken conversation moving between them in every stifled breath and squeeze of limb. The fear of having lost each other again, of just being gone, that he might have left or she might have left - Killian understands their language at last. He tries to reassure as best he can, tries to tell her without words that he isn’t going anywhere. Eventually, Emma seems to gather herself together enough to be willing to stop holding him so tight. She steps back, her hand instantly finding his own, fingers lacing together as they prepare to brainstorm. There is something so comfortably familiar about this, the team all coming together to see what they can do to stop whatever new danger is threatening them. 

They gather at the kitchen table, each offering what little they know of this realm. It’s not enough on its own to be able to come up with any serious plan of attack, any defense and Emma is still stuck on trying to work out what she has already done that could be considered the answer to getting Killian out of the Underworld. Everyone is deep in thought or quiet conversation and he takes these moments to just watch this collection of undeniably crazy people who have all marched down here determined to drag him out. So what if it was impossible? So what if it had never been done? They were going to do it and he doesn’t doubt them.

Blue eyes travel around the table, taking in David and Snow talking quietly together, and while he might have said he forgave Prince Charming, he knows not everything is fixed. Killian even believes he has forgiven the pair, but he knows how easy words actually are, how words and actions don't always line up with each other. He hopes though - he hopes when it comes down to it, that they will prove themselves to him, and he to them. He wants their friendship, wants their belief, a hunger that gnaws at him relentlessly. 

Is it possible that they have finally been able to overlook the whole pirate thing?

(Before, he would have said no. Before he would have laughed at the possibility and the idea that he might care what they think of him. He is too dead, and too tired now, to gather up such pretense around him like the battered cloak it is. He cares. 

He’s always cared.)

Regina stands behind Henry, her hands on the back of his chair. Fingers curl tightly against the back of the chair, knuckles almost turned white with the effort to hold still and every now and then one finger breaks away in a faint little tapping motion. Now that he takes the time to actually think about it, she has been acting a strange since she got here. A little bit more restless than normal, less the poised perfect Queen he has come to know. She seems to be unable to hold herself still. The longer he watches her, the more obvious the differences become. Her hair is slightly mussed up, a few strands sticking up here and there. Not enough to be noticeable at a quick glance and on anyone else, perhaps not even worth thinking about - but this is Regina Mills. She never has a hair out of place. So why now?

His eyes meet her own, Killian recoiling at little at the unguarded pain and fear that is shining in them. It only lasts for a moment, before her own walls slam up, gaze becoming cool and calculating once more but it is too late. He has seen into her soul and it worries him. Gaze dances away from his own, as though unable to hold it any longer, slipping to stare at something over Emma’s shoulder.

Mouth opens, determined to question her on it and they had never been the sort to dance around a subject. It is one of the main reasons why they have had such an antagonist relationship in the past and Killian doesn’t know if this will help or not. 

All he knows is that he wants to try and help and letting Regina stew in whatever is going on in her mind is not the way to go about it. 

A knock at the door sounds out, the room instantly dropping to a sudden silence. Killian’s mouth snaps shut, his head turning to stare at the front door as though his gaze could somehow bore through it and see whoever was on the other side. For a moment, everyone is still. Unsurprisingly it is Emma who stands first, moving gracefully around the table and crossing the distance to open it. 

De’ja Vu sweeps across him for a second. 

Once again, it is Liam on the other side. He looks startled like before, a moment of rawness before he offers Emma that smile, the one Killian can finally tell is fake, a brittle mask against the world. Just like before, his brother’s attention is firmly fixed on him as they both automatically move towards each other.

“Liam...” Killian breathes out in greeting, just as before.

The similarities end there. His brother looks a lot worse for wear, his clothing and hair all messed up as though he has been pulling at them in the hours since they parted. Liam doesn’t seem to have the energy to even keep up the smile for more than a couple of seconds, expression crumpling into one deep sorrow. He never wants to see that expression on the face of someone he loves. 

(He’s seen it far too many times already.)

“You don't need me anymore, do you Killian.” Where before there had been anger, now there was just a deep rooted sadness to his voice, an aching pain that Killian wishes he could wipe clean away.

“What are you talking about? You're my brother, of course I need you. I always will need you.” 

“Not like that though. I was so...” Liam pauses for a moment, hand lifting in the air as he searches for the right word. “So fixated on the idea that you were my baby brother, the one that I had to look after, that you were still the same scared little child I had raised that I closed my eyes to everything else.”

Killian doesn't really know what to say to that. Luckily, Liam doesn't seem to expect an answer, the other man simply carrying on his speech.

“I refused to see the man you had grown up to become. For all his flaws, still a good man.” Liam reaches out, gripping Killian’s shoulder tightly. “I did a lot of thinking brother. And you were right, this isn't my choice to make. You can stand on your own feet and I need to let you go.”

“Liam...” Killian’s throat feels tight, choked with emotion. This would be the perfect time to tell him how much he loves him, how dearly he cares. How much it mattered to him that Liam had so effortlessly stepped up to the plate and taken over the role of father. The words refuse to form though, lying heavy and thick on his tongue, and all he can do is stare helplessly at his brother.

“Hades was using me wasn’t he? Trying to distract you all, get me angry so you were focused on me and not on trying to somehow cheat death. I can tell you this... Hades regrets the deal he made with you. Persephone thinks you’re going to figure it out.”

“Do you know the answer?” Emma interrupts, tone hopeful. The hope is dashed seconds later as Liam shakes his head in response.

“I went to talk to him again after Killian left. He and Persephone were arguing. Maybe they meant me to hear, maybe they didn't. All I know is she thinks he made it too easy, that the answer is obvious. It's something that's been done before, something more than one of you have done before. Experts in solving it she said.”

Killian has no idea what to do with this new information. Bringing someone back from the dead is not anything any of them have done before, so what on earth can they have meant? Assuming they were being truthful of course and not just spinning a tale, knowing full well that Liam was listening in and would share everything he heard. 

Liam gasps suddenly, gaze going distant for a moment. Killian has seen that look before, very recently in fact. He knows what it means. The glow of light blossoming around his brother confirms it, Killian swallowing down the conflicting emotions as he realises he is about to lose his brother for a second time. 

This time, at least, to something better. And now he knows Liam will be there to greet him, when he finally crosses over himself - hopefully many years from now, should he manage to defeat Hades and find a way back to the world of the living. All he can do right now is watch as Liam turns away from the group, his attention firmly fixed on the light beyond. 

Emma settles herself next to him, fingers brushing against his hook. He cannot feel it if course, but he has always appreciated her willingness to touch the hook as though it was just a part of him instead of some ugly, shameful thing.

In front of them, Liam pauses. Turns back to face them. He is already starting to become a little translucent around the edges, already fading as though he cannot wait to pass now he realises his unfinished business had been finished long ago.

“Are you coming brother?” Liam asks hopefully, extending his hand. Out of view, but somewhere close by is their mother, he just knows it. He is tempted, of course he is. That is, he rather suspects, the whole point. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Swan swallow heavily, fingers tightening against the metal of his hook. She keeps quiet though, she lets him make the choice himself.

Maybe things really are going to be different. Maybe they have both learnt new things.

“I want to, more than I can say... but this isn’t my path, not yet.” Not when he can still walk further with Emma.

Liam’s smile is sad but knowing, gaze shifting to stare at Emma for a few long moments as if seeing her for the first time and taking the opportunity to weight her up.

“Maybe she can become good enough for you after all Killian. Stay safe, little brother.”

“Younger.”

Laugh is free, a melody that Killian thinks he could listen to forever. It is a sound he loves as deeply as the roar of the waves or the way Emma breathe his name. Of course he would discover how much he loves the sound now he is on the cusp of losing it forever.

“Right. Be good younger brother, I'm proud of you. We all are, never forget that. I love you Killian.”

“I love you too Liam.”

He fades faster with each passing second, the warm light curling around him, until, in between blinks, he is simply gone.

And now there is only one Jones brother left. 

Just like before.

\--

It hurts to loose Liam a second time, hurts in a way that Milah’s passing hadn't. 

Killian wonders if maybe that is because the type of love at work. While he still loves Milah, he is no longer _in_ love with her. And Liam... well, he loves his brother with a ferocity that has not waned with the passing of time. He loved and lost and mourned and yet a few moments back in his brother’s company and it as though all those years of learning how to deal with the pain of him not being there have been wiped clear away.

Logically, he knows that both have moved on to a better place, a peaceful place away from pain and loneliness. A place he could have travelled to as well if he wanted. He has made his choice and he doesn't regret what he picked, not at all. He just... he just-

(He is selfish. He wants both options, not this where no matter how he wins, he will loses. Knowing he cannot have both, does not change the desperate yearning to want both.)

He doesn't know what he wants.

His heart aches. As though it has been plucked from his chest and squeezed until it was left bruised and weak. It aches as though it still beats within his body, and he marvels again at this realm, which gave such painful gifts. If it wasn’t for the fact he knows the truth, knows that everything around here is just fractionally off in shade, taste or look, it would be easy to forget. Easy to fool yourself into thinking you were alive. A strange kind of hell indeed.

He is still staring at the spot where Liam had last stood, staring and staring and staring. Eyes start to sting but Killian cannot look away, cannot so much as blink. Suddenly he is rather afraid of what might happen if he does blink, if he lets this moment pass him by. Liam will really be gone for a start, and before he knows it, the others may be good. He might be alone again and as much as he might deserve it, he doesn't want it. So he stares and his eyes burn, his vision blurs and still he feels himself frozen.

“Killian?” Emma’s voice shakes him out of the mini stupor he had fallen into. 

Emma.

Emma is still here. 

Emma is real.

Blue eyes finally pull away from that spot, to stare at her with an intensity that even Killian knows is a little too over the top. Her hands lift and fall, as though to reach out to him before pulling back. She is unsure but he lets her take this time, biting down on the urge to just comfort her. Something tells him this is another important moment.

To be fair, this is his Swan. He would give her all the time in the world. He would give her the world itself if he could.

She closes her eyes, breathing out deeply, centering herself. Her words, when they finally come, are more than worth the wait, and shake him to his very core.

“I... I was wrong Killian. I should have listened to you, to what you wanted. I should... I should have destroyed the darkness and then marched down here to drag you back in the first place.”

Killian manages a weak smile at that. Oh, he would have loved to have seen it play out that way, seen her glow and burn with the right kind of light. Without the weight of what they had both done weighing her down. Yet another to add to the what ifs, the pile of if only and maybe that litters his psyche like so much ill gotten plunder. It does him as much good as gold ever did too.

“I took away your choice. I was selfish. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.” Emma whispers. Just that. No more excuses, no more attempts at justifying her actions, no more claiming that it had been worth it. Just regret and sorrow and the acceptance of mistakes made. “I'm sorry I wasn't strong enough, I'm so sorry I hurt you.”

“I'm sorry too love,” Killian whispers, feeling the last of that bitterness sinking away. Not gone forever, but gone and buried enough that he can tell her the truth as it is in this moment. Enough that they can start to heal.

“Well, isn't this just so sweet. Lovers reunions are always worthy of celebration.” The velvet like tones of Hades cut in through the moment they have created around themselves. Killian springs apart from Emma, spinning to face the enemy. He won't let her be hurt, not again.

The world tilts and shifts as he does. He feels it tug on him as it moves. Colours shift and shimmer, the room twisting until they are suddenly standing in the garden of Persephone once more. The pillar he had been chained too is still there, metal cuffs lying in the grass. They seem to mock him in their silence, a mute testimony to yet another moment of his weakness.

Hades looks completely unruffled by either the magic he has used to drag them here or the furious glares sent his way by both of them. He looks down at his hand, idly examining his nails.

“Sorry to interrupt your tender little moment, but I do believe you have forgotten something rather important.” He smirks as he speaks, attention still on his nails but there is an air of triumph around him, as though he has defeated them already and is coming to gloat about it.

Something cold and sinking starts to form in his chest. The same something that coils around him, the fear that they have lost and they just don't know it. The something that whispers there is something else he should know, something hovering just out of reach.

“I haven't forgotten _you_ , Hades. Or the deal. There wasn't a time limit remember?” Emma all but spits the words and not for the first time he wonders what happened between them, what she had been forced to offer up for this chance. Hades simply laughs, the sound grating against Killian’s ears. Hades starts to stalk towards them, gaze narrowed and fixed on Emma. He would give anything to have that focus on him instead and away from the woman he loves.

Oh, I wasn't talking to you. No, not you Emma Swan. Him.” As if in answer to his silent pleading, the God's attention snaps back to him, those inhuman eyes drilling into him as if trying to cowl him into submission. Killian meets the stare head on. He has faced down Persephone, he has been caught in the power of her gaze, had his soul ripped apart and reformed by her eyes. Her husband had nothing on her. 

(Is it his imagination, or does a faint twitch of a smile appear on Hades face when he thinks of Persephone? Killian keeps forgetting the power of the God, the ability to read minds or souls, however they want to phrase it. He fears the lady of this realm far more than its dread lord, for all that Hades is the one facing him now. Another twitch of a smile crosses grey skin.)

“I think it's time you remember what you saw...” Hades murmurs, gliding closer. He seems to move in one fluid step, as though he is floating instead of actually walking. It happens in an instant, the exhale of a breath and suddenly he is in front of Killian, one cold hand wrapped around his wrist. It feels like ice in the deepest of winter, cutting deep into him and stealing his breath right away from his chest.

“Stop!” 

Emma tries to move, to break the contact between them and while he wants to warn her, wants to fight for her, wants to do - _something_ \- to protect her.

Hades flicks her away as if she were nothing, a bug to be squashed. He doesn't even touch her, arm simply lifting and in the same moment she is flying through the air. Her back connects with the pillar, body arching in pain as she lets out a strangeling moan. Killian can do nothing but watch it unfold in front of him. Thankfully, Hades immediately returns his attention to him, dismissing Emma once more. 

“That's better. No more interruptions. You and your little group have been very busy haven't you? Running round my realm, getting old souls to pass on. Ones that should never have been able to... unfinished business can only be concluded within a short window and yet here you are, resolving issues centuries old. I am... almost impressed Captain. Of course, the number of souls you delivered to me that are still trapped here far outweigh the two you helped pass on. Still... such actions deserve a reward I think.”

Hades second hand wraps around Killian’s throat, lifting him a few inches off the ground with frightening ease. It tightens a little, cutting into his air supply without completely strangling him. Enough to make him squirm and gasp in the hold and the chill sinking into his skin to feel almost secondarily to the sensation of slowly being strangled.

“Remember...”

Killian’s eyes go impossibly wide, staring into the beyond. Back in time, back to when he had first seen Milah here, when he had first seen Swan, when he had seen... when he had seen-

“No. Regina...” Name is whispered, Killian feeling his chest contract painfully as the memory is returned to him. No wonder she had looked so restless, so lost at times. No wonder she had found no peace here, not even in sleep. 

“There you go.” The smirk on Hades face is infuriating, the way he is acting as though he has already won, to the extent that he is willing to show some more of the cards in his hand. Killian so desperately wants to punch that expression right off his features. The smirk - if anything - grows. 

“Still can read your thoughts... _mate_.” Hades sneers, hand tightening even further around his wrist. Bones start to creak in protest, grinding together despite not being real - no matter how many times he tries to convince himself that this isn’t his body, that he is no longer made of flesh and blood, it seems as though his mind as other ideas. He can feel the bruises forming, layer upon layer of bruises.

Killian scowls, his worry for Regina for a moment submerged below the desire to make Hades pay for all the taunts and petty humiliations.

He thinks dirty, dirty thoughts. As loudly and as crassly as he can. About Persephone, about Cerberus, about the various souls, statues, about what Hades can do with his throne. Anything and everything he can possibly conjure up.

The smirk drops from Hades face but he barely has the chance to enjoy his victory. Fingers dig deeper into his throat, Killian choking and wheezing as he tries to drag in oxygen. Black spots start to dance across his vision as 

Abruptly, the pressure is gone, along with the hand holding him up. He crumples to the ground, barely aware of the jolt as body connects to the floor or the blink and you miss it disappearance of Hades. Killian pants heavily, limbs trembling slightly. Head is dipped, ignoring Swan and her worry as he fights just to keep himself conscious. If there is any downside to no longer being the Dark One, it is the knowledge of how weak he is physically in comparison. He feels every blow now and his form struggles to recover as easily as he once had.

Being dead _sucks_ as Henry would say. 

Speaking of Henry... his hand shoots out, grabbing Swan by the arm as he finally lifts his head to look at her, his own panic reflected clearly in her gaze.

“The furies... they are coming for Regina.” Killian forces out, trying to clamber ungainly back to his feet. “We have to find her. Now!”

\--

“Come on Killian, tell me what these furies are?” Emma asks as they hurry along strange paths. Persephone’s garden is somewhere behind them but he isn't sure exactly where. He doesn't know how to get back to where they started, let alone how to find their way out of this maze of paths and back to the town and rest of the group.

Killian swears the world is shifting around them, reacting to their presence, trying to keep them from where they want to go. He has moved from the garden to the town already - admittedly, part of that had been via the air but it still hadn’t taken this long. The paths hadn’t been as twisting and winding as these. They were as grey and as lifeless as before, the whispers just loud enough to be heard as mutterings. He kicks at a loose rock, watching as it bounces along the path and is swallowed up by the mists lurking beyond. 

“Think of them as like the police of this realm. Only they are also judge, jury and executioner... no, that not right. They don't directly kill, they merely drive you insane and normally you end up killing yourself. All my years, never heard of them failing to punish someone once they have them.” Killian tells her grimly. 

“Okay...” Emma replies, still sounding lost. She is as worried as he is but he knows it's only because he is. She trusts him enough to know to be worried, to try and get back to the others while asking for answers instead of demanding the information first.

It is such a small and simple step and yet at the same time it is such an important one. That she would trust first and understand second.

They are going to win.

It strikes him so suddenly that Killian comes to a complete stop, staring ahead at nothing in particular.

They are going to _win_ against the Gods. 

“But Regina hasn't committed any crimes here? At least, nothing the rest of us haven't done.” Emma continues on, oblivious to his sudden epiphany and he supposes it is his fault for not making it as clear as it could be but time is of the essence here. They turn another corner, path seeming to trail back upon itself and he has to bite down the noise of frustration. Things would be so much simpler if they could risk the mists, but then why would Hades want that? He is probably enjoying this far too much. 

“Yeah...” Killian trails off, drawing in a sharp breath between his teeth. “The furies are less concerned with crimes committed here and more summoned to our worlds to punish those who have commited the gravest of sins. Like killing a parent say.”

He sighs, turning to face her completely, and these paths are a trick. They aren't getting out of here until whatever magic is running the place allows them out. Until then, he may as well lay all his cards on the table, make her see just how deadly the furies are.

“Look at it this way Swan. I wouldn’t wish the furies on my worst enemy. And believe you me, he _more_ than qualifies to be worthy of their attention.” Killian can't help the way his voice twists into an angry snarl as he speaks and he might have decided not to try and kill the Crocodile anymore, might have accepted that the monster that murdered Milah is long dead and gone with a new man it his place.

He might even have _forgiven_ the creature now wearing the Crocodile’s face. That doesn't mean he has forgotten and Killian knows he will never be able to fully forget what had happened. It would dishonour her memory. 

Despite all that, even in his darkest days, he would never have contemplated unleashing the furies upon the Dark One.

(Of course he had considered it. He had been hampered by ability, ingredients and eventually the knowledge that they would have turned upon him as well, possibly even before they sought out the Crocodile. He might have been suicidal during those darkest of days but he would never have gone through with such a plan unless he had been convinced they would destroy the Crocodile first. After... well, after he wouldn't have cared. It would have been an end and that would have been enough for him. Not like now, when he finally has something beyond revenge to live for.)

A cry cuts through the conversation, and it would have melted any heart of ice, Killian is sure of it. The anguish in the sound chills him to the bone, the cry of someone pushed beyond all normal limits, pushed to a place of mortal dread. He doesn’t need to look to Emma to know that she has heard it also, that she knows exactly who it belongs to. Regina is in danger. 

The path turns to the left in front of them and he swears that a second ago it had been straight. There is little time to wonder at the pathing of the Underworld, the pair breaking out into a sprint. The scream had come from the left and it feels as though finally, the magics at work here at working with them instead of against them. That or Hades wants them to find her now, as badly as they do. 

Killian doesn’t know how long they run, her screams ringing in his ears. It feels like an age until finally they stumble out of the mists. Regina’s imposing home looms up before them, the pair standing in front of her open gates. It is the only building in sight though, the rest of the town hidden from view by those same infuriating fog clouds. It is an island rising up out of the mists. Killian can’t help the stray thought that passes across his mind, the worry that this might not even be real. 

Regina screams again and all other thoughts vanish, scattered like ash on the wind.

The sound is coming from behind the large white house, Killian using the screams to guide him. She stands in the back garden, near an apple tree that he is sure does not belong there. Then again, the tree is one of the most potent symbols of the Evil Queen. It is hardly surprising it would have been moved here, in this bizarro version of the town. Regina’s hands are both tangled in her hair, pulling at it harshly, her eyes wide, staring at something only she can see.

He has seen people brought low before. He has seen the great and the good humbled by more powerful forces. Hell, he has _been_ that more powerful force - just as he has been the one being crushed. It is never a pleasant sight and it is worse now, to see it happen to someone he might one day call friend. 

(A few years ago, he might even have enjoyed this. A few years ago he had been in a position of power over Regina. A different version of Regina, just as it had been a different version of him. They are forever changing, forever shifting old skins and gaining new ones. It has taken him far too long to realise that, far too many decades stuck in the past, letting himself be trapped in one place, physically and mentally.)

As one, he and Emma move forward - or at least try to. A few steps forward is all they can manage before they come up against some invisible force, stopping their progress abruptly. It’s enough to send them staggering back a step, brought to a sudden stop. Killian lifts a hand as he steps forward again and pushes. No matter how much force he put into it, his hand doesn’t actually move, as though he was trying to push through some wall. Some powerful magic is at play here, and out of the corner of his eye he can see Emma lift a hand attempting to do the same. Her movements are move like a punch than a push but even her magic seems useless against whatever is blocking them from moving closer.

Regina collapses to the ground by the tree and just screams. It is heart wrenching to hear, an ugly sobbing scream as he gasps and heaves, tears streaming down her face. Her whole body is shuddering from the rush of emotions coursing through her, too caught in the grip of powerful feelings to be able to care about what she looks like. All they can do is watch as she unravels in front of them, so close and yet powerless to help.

Her hands claw frantically at the ground, digging deep into the soil, and he can't tell if is trying to find something or escape. Possibly both. Possibly neither. She digs without thought for her hands or anything around her, fingers raking over packed soil, tossing clumps aside in her desperate quest. Whatever it may actually be.

Killian hates this feeling of being helpless and there must be some way to break the barrier, some way to get across it and actually reach Regina. For the lad’s sake if nothing else, he won’t let him lose another member of his family. There has to be something he can do!

_“Of course there is something you can do. One last adventure Killian Jones...”_ Persephone's voice drifts on the wind, curling around him almost like some tangible presence. He twists violently, head snapping this way and that as he tries to pinpoint her location, but there is nobody else in sight. Beside him, Emma lifts an eyebrow in puzzlement, apparently oblivious to the voice and for a moment he wonders if he is going mad. Around him, he hears the throaty chuckle of Persephone, taunting him. Not mad. He isn’t mad. She is in his head and that is almost worse.

_“Do not disappoint me, my pirate.”_ Her voice is like poison in his ear, and for a moment he is convinced he can feel her lips brushing against the tips of them. _“Let’s see how you get out of this one.”_


	9. Chapter Nine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Author's Notes:** Thanks for sticking with me guys, sorry once again for the delay between chapters, but here we go, chapter nine, almost there.
> 
> And exciting news guys, the final chapter will be coming next week! I feel very inspired and I don’t want to leave you all waiting even longer for the end. Kudos and comments as always, feed the soul and encourage the muses.

## 

** Chapter Nine **

####  _**so close that your hand on my chest is my hand, - Pablo Neruda**_

__  
Persephone's voice lingers in his mind long after the actual sound - if actual sound there even was - has faded. They taunt him, defy him their actual meaning because they imply this moment is something special, something more powerful that merely trying to save Regina’s life. Or her sanity. The Furies leave their marks on people, even those who do not die. He had met one previous victim before, an old man, sightless. The creature - to call the husk that remained human had seemed grotesque in the extreme - had wandered the docks at one of his regular haunts, begging for spare change, for food.

It had surprised Captain Hook, at first, that the people of the tiny village had been willing to share their food with such a beast. The male was almost bend double, a trembling, wounded, sad sack of a life. He had once been the lord of the area, and committed crimes that had left even the feared Captain hook reeling from disgust. Nothing had been beneath him, no crime too dastardly, no man, woman or even child spared from his ill intent. He had deserved the Furies attention and even the apparent mercy of the villagers was anything but. They had been commanded by them to feed the man, to keep him alive in order to drag out his mortal punishment. 

It was many years later before he learnt the truth behind the blindness. The gashes crisscrossing his face and gorging out his eyes hadn’t been caused by the Furies directly - no, the man had clawed out his own eyes in a bid to try and escape the visions, the torture they had inflicted upon him. It hadn’t worked of course, the images now a permanent fixture behind his forever closed eyelids. It doesn’t take much for Killian to image Regina in his place, to see her bent and broken forever, to have her worn to a mere shadow of her former self. 

He cannot let that history repeat itself. 

If this is part of the plot to keep them distracted from trying to rescue him, then Killian has to say, it is working. Even if none of this makes any real sense. A last adventure. To not disappoint her. The Queen of the Underworld must be nearby, watching this play out and something tells him that this is more than just simple entertainment for her now. More than just a distraction? 

But this doesn't fit in with what Emma told him. Frustration tugs at his mind, the emotion growing with every passing moment and not for the first time he wishes he had been in the room when the deal had been made. It was his life - death - at stake after all, his whole being that was being fought over. Why does he still not know exactly what happened with Emma and Hades?

How can this be their test? It doesn’t _fit_.

Or does it? Do they have to lose here? Is part of the price that Hades has demanded they must pay in order for his soul to return to the land of the living. It is the sort of sick game he can image the God might take some jaded pleasure from, to balance the scales or some other nonsense. Regina’s sanity, her very soul exchanged in order for Killian to escape his fate. 

(Would Emma pay that? Would Killian let her pay that? Could he?)

Carefully, they feel along the length of the invisible wall, searching for any gaps. It stretches out a good fifty feet around the tree, an unbroken dome that traps Regina within and them without. 

A perfect circle for them to watch, with the Evil Queen center stage. She has always liked to draw a crowd, an eye, but he doubts this is the kind she would ever have imagined.

Regina arcs on the ground as though electricity is running through her, limbs shaking wildly as whatever pain she is in reaches its terrifying heights. It is no comfort to know whatever she is seeing, feeling, is only in her mind. It is real to Regina and that makes the pain real, makes the effects it is having on her body real.

She has long since lost her voice, vocal cords worn through by the raw and agonized screams. An endless array of noise, of pure pain torn from her throat over and over again until it had been unable to take it any further. A jagged rasp of a scream still slips out, little more than a high pitched wheeze. Even without her voice, she is still made to scream, to suffer.

Somehow the wheezing sounds so much worse than the actual screams of minutes ago.

“There has to be something we can do! We can't just stand here and... watch this!” Emma cries, looking to him for guidance, for an idea. Killian wishes he had any sort of idea on how to fix this. He’s heard of Furies yes, he's seen their handiwork, but he has never heard of any way to defeat them, to get them to back off beyond a single story and even that man had endured years of torment before the Gods themselves had stepped in but that does not help them here and now.

(He wonders if Persephone is the key then. She would probably enjoy them begging her for help. She would equally, probably not help, rescuing mortals does not seem her style. He senses, rather than sees or hears, her agreement, a gentle press on his mind as though she is trying to nudge him away from making a mistake.)

They aren't evil in the traditional sense - really, they aren't evil at all, or on the flip side good - and Killian knows they cannot be defeated in any of the ways they have fought dangers on the past. Really, all he knows for sure, is that he doesn't have any ideas on what to do. Emma is looking to him for answers, for his knowledge of this realm to enable them to pull some miracle out of a hat and save the day. And he has nothing to offer her.

“Of course there is nothing you can do.” The voice that cuts through them is feminine but it does not belong to Persephone. Someone else, someone... new. He can’t help but notice how similar the words are to what Persephone had told him, the phrasing the same even as the mysterious whoever claims the exact opposite. How they feed almost too easily into his own thoughts. 

“Who are you? No, scratch that, where are you?” Emma demands. Ever practical, ever determined. One problem at a time, never letting herself think any further in advance. 

A shadow starts to form in front of them, leeching its shape from the shade cast by the building. Tendrils snake across the grass, swirling and joining the writhing mess of darkness. It starts off as little more than a shifting ball like object, each strip of shadow adding more shape to it. A vaguely female form hovers in front of them in a matter of moments, distinguishable only by long hair and what seems to be a dress around her body.

“Hello Killian Jones. Emma Swan. I am Tisiphone of the Furies.” 

The shadow has teeth he notes with a detached shiver. Sharp little fangs that somehow glint in the light, despite the rest of her form being made up by a pale, grey smoke like substance. He's seen shadows before - this is not the same as Pan’s shadow, and once again, his knowledge is useless here, once again he fails Emma. 

(How many more times will he fail her before she declares it is just too much? He wants to be strong, wants to believe in them, but it is hard to unlearn a lifetime of never being quite good enough.) 

“The woman is ours now.”

\--

He thinks, perhaps the fury had expected them to leave after her announcement. It takes no grandstanding, no dramatic flourishes to prove her identity - really, what else could the shadowling be? They are used to mortals cowering before them, running or begging for a mercy that will never come. They expect a certain reaction from those the show themselves to, an arrogant thought perhaps but no less deserved because of it. The Furies are terrifying and almost anyone who meets them would be desperate to escape and so thankful that they were given that chance. 

Somewhere along the way, the barrier has vanished, the two of them able to run right up to Regina. She screams at the movement, flinching violently away from outstretched hands, her back connecting with the trunk as she tries to escape. Seeing someone like Regina - so normally self controlled, everything about herself tied up and under control - in pieces like this would have been enough to send a fainter heart reeling, to make many back down as the fury expects them to do.

Then again, they have never come up against Emma Swan before. 

(Killian is almost sorry for them, in a way. They have no idea what they are up against.)

Her lips curl up into a smile that is animalistic in nature, baring her teeth at her enemy without any fear. It doesn’t matter that they might not be evil in the same, simple way that so many of her opponents over the years have been evil They are not the imp Pan. It doesn’t matter that they hover more in the grey area, more an Ingrid than anything else. All that matters is they are threatening someone she cares about and Emma will not let that happen. 

This is the Swan he knows and loves. The one who will wade into the thick of battle without any hesitation simply because she knows it is the right thing to do. Nothing else matters right now, not even the fact that she is standing up to some all powerful being. 

Gods, she is so stubborn, beyond the point of recklessness. He loves that about her. He loves everything about her. Killian holds onto those thoughts as the shadows start to shift once more, leeching yet more from the house, from the tree, even from the shadows they create with their bodies. It shudders and twists in front of them, smokey shade becoming more and more solid. Colour creeps across is, creating skin and clothing out of nothing.

An old crone stands before them in a matter of moments, wearing a blood-wet dress, the hem line tattered and ripped around her knees. It is a simple cut outfit, one designed for a much younger woman, necklace plunging low as though to entice, although that too is ripped and worn. Her hair is alive with snakes, dozens of tiny heads writhing and hissing. Some snap at each other hungrily, small but deadly jaws and teeth mashing at the air.

Form shimmers and shifts, as though it is a step out of time with the rest of the world around them. In one moment it is the old crone, the next a young woman - still the same face, the same soul. Then another and flesh slops off the bone, a half eaten corpse before them until it loops back to one of the living forms. 

His mind revolts at the sight in front of him, flesh crawling as he tries to comprehend what he was actually looking at. Beside him, Emma sucks in a short, sharp breath before squeezing his hand gently, offering silent comfort and taking a little herself. Killian breathes out through his nose and tries to just stay in the moment. 

“A soul for a soul,” Tisiphone intones with awful finality. “She killed her father, she must be punished for that. You are a keeper of the law in your world Emma Swan. We are the keeper of divine law in all worlds. Believe me, we take little pleasure in this. It is our duty, nothing more, nothing less.”

“She is a different person now!” Emma snaps. He notices her gaze is angled just a little to the left of the fury, staring over her shoulder instead of meeting her gaze and staring eye to eye - when the fury actually had a working eye of course and not just an empty socket.

Below them, Regina whimpers at the harsh tone, her body curling up to try and make herself as small as possible, as though she could disappear completely from under their notice.

Tisiphone tilts her head to the side, genuine confusion and an all round lack of understanding on her face. For all that the Furies take on some semblance of the form of humans, it is clear that they do not fully grasp every concept humans use. Forgiveness seems to be one of them. What must it be like, to live as one without mercy?

(Killian knows what it is like to be the creature without mercy, without compassion. To be heartless in a completely different sense of the word. Emma had been able to get through to him then, had cracked open his shell just as she had done with so many others. Even - as much as it makes a little bile rise in his throat to think it - even the crocodile had found some way to flake away a little of the stone that had encased his heart. 

Not that it changed him from being a coward of course, too afraid to even come down here after stealing back some of that dark power. But enough that Killian feels he is starting to understand mercy. That perhaps they are a few steps closer to understanding each other.)

“She killed her father,” Tisiphone repeats as though that settles the issue. Killian supposes in her mind it does. A sin, once committed stains the soul and no amount of water or good deeds can ever hope to wash clean those marks. Wickness will always show. He used to believe that once upon a time. He had thought the crimes Captain Hook had committed had cursed him for all of eternity. That it didn’t matter how noble his end goals might be or how much worse his enemy was by comparison, he was still a villain himself. He was going to burn for what he had already done, which meant that the pleas of his victims fell on perfectly deaf ears.

Why waste time trying to do the right thing, the harder if more noble thing, when it wouldn’t change his own personal fate? If he was cursed either way, then what reward for doing good could outweigh the reward for doing evil, be it gold or another item to get him one step closer to skinning his foe. 

But then he had met Emma. Then he started to fall in love. Even more incredibly, she had started to fall back. Most of all, then he had seen his own heart. Rich ruby red with only specs of black within. Physical proof that it was all worth it. That it was worth trying to do the right thing, trying to redeem himself, to drag himself bit by painful bit out of the dark hole he had fallen into. Forgiveness was a real, living, breathing thing and because he had not been looking for it, he had be granted the sight of it.

Few had been gifted such a gift. 

And if Captain Hook could be redeemed after everything he has done, then so can Regina. She is not the same Evil Queen that had crushed the heart of her father in order to enact a Dark Curse. Just as he is not the same - but still dashingly handsome - pirate that had killed his father in a fit of rage. 

_A soul for a soul..._

“So did I! Take me in her place,” Killian suddenly demands and it is as though the scales have dropped from his eyes and for the first time since waking up in the Underworld, things make sense. This is why Hades allowed him to remember when he did. This is why the paths led them out to the house in time to talk to one of the Furies. 

They were always going to end up here and he was always going to realise that you don’t cheat Death. Not like this, not after so many times at thumbing his nose at death, at escaping just before its jaws could close around him. He was always going to understand the rules that could not be broken, the give and take that had to happen.

He was never going to come back to the living world, unless a soul was given up in his place. A soul for a soul, just as Tisiphone had said. He has to make a choice here and he would laugh if he wasn’t so terrified of the consequences, but he will not let fear win here again. His crimes deserve no less than the Furies attentions. 

It had never been a choice at all. His soul, for Regina’s. Now that really was the steal of the century. 

“Take... you?” Tisiphone parrots the words back, as though she does not understand them - or maybe she just wants him to admit what he has done.

“A soul for a soul right? That's what you said. I'm here, you must know what I've done, who I've done it to.” 

“Killian, no!” Emma steps between them, hand sprayed flat against his chest. The fury is all but forgotten, his attention instantly narrowing to the point of heat her fingers cause, directly above where his heart would beat. “You can’t! Besides, you heard what she said, they are here because Regina killed her father.”

“So did I love,” Killian admittes softly, a sad smile on his face. Emma falters in front of him, blinking rapidly as she struggles to work through what he has just admitted. 

This is not how he would have wanted her to find out.

(It is perhaps the best way for her to find out. Better to frame it in some heroic action, to try and fashion something good out of such a wicked act. Better for her to hear it like this, rather than someone else telling her, or the truth torn from trembling lips in the heat of some terrible battle. He’s made that mistake before and it nearly cost him everything. Secrets only damage their relationship and he fears the ocean that makes up his own could suffocate her under the weight of it all.)

“I killed my father,” he says again, spine snapping to attention as he adopts the pose of a Leftenant once more. He might not be in the navy any longer but he can still face his destiny with some pride and honour. He can do his duty at long last. The warmth above his heart is like the physical embodiment of courage, giving him the strength to do this and he knows he needs to treasure it, that it will be the last good warmth he will ever feel.

“You...” Emma trails off, at a loss for words suddenly unsure what to say or do. Killian hopes he hasn’t lost her with this final admittance, that this is not the straw that will break the camel's back. If this is their end, he wants to end with her, not with her turning her back on him.

Then again, would it not be easier on her, if she hated him in his final moments? If she realised how wicked he truly was? Emma might be able to move on if her love has turned to anger, no matter how much added pain it caused him. He knows how selfish it is, to want her to still love him and so suffer even further as a result.

Not for the first time, he wishes he was a better person for her. He wishes he could shake a younger version of himself until he saw sense. Then again, without his quest for revenge he would never have ended up in Neverland, would never have lived as long as he did. He would have been ash and bones long before she was even born. Strange, to think that even out of so much evil, something good, like the love between them could grow. 

“I did it to prove myself, I did it out of revenge for what he had done to me and my brother, I did it out of anger that the man had been able to move on from us and the pain he had caused so readily. But none of that alters the fact that I still killed my father. And I accept my punishment for it.”

Tisiphone tilts her head to the side as she studies him carefully, eyes sweeping over his form. Forked tongue flicks out to wet lips, a hungry look growing in her eyes as his history unfolds in her mind.

“Take me, but let her go.” Killian adds and he doesn’t know if such a thing is possible, doesn’t even know if they will keep their word but he has to at least try. He will accept his punishment if it spares Regina hers. 

“Agreed.”

“Killian no, please, don't do this! There is another way, there has to be another way. We just need a little time in order to find it,” Emma pleads, eyes filling with tears that refuse to actually fall. She seems to glow in this moment, her pain splashed across them both. He knows the sharp stab of a beautiful pain, knows that this look pales in comparison to the sight of her smiling, full on joy. It is however, one of the last moments he is going to get with her, the seconds slipping by them relentlessly, grains of sand swallowed whole by the desert. 

Better a moment with her, than a moment alone. And so very soon now, he knows he is going to be alone.

“There is no time love,” he tells her sadly and oh, how he wishes she could pull something out of her hat at the last second, as they were so prone to doing. He knows it will not work, not this time. Not with a fury breathing down their necks. “Regina is almost gone already.”

Tear stained eyes drop from him to look at the woman at their feet. Regina is staring up at the cloudy grey sky, eyes glassy. Her mouth moves slowly, mouthing out silent words and it takes Killian a couple of long moments to work out what she is saying. His lip reading skills are rusty at best, but not for the first time, he almost finds himself wishing that he didn’t have a particular skill. This moment hurts, but knowing what Regina is saying just hurts more. 

The name Henry repeats over and over, silent pleading for her son or her father, Killian isn’t sure. Along with snatches of prayer, wishes for mercy, for an escape from the punishment that is burning through her body and mind.

A silent sob wracks Emma’s form as she watches the scene unfold. He wonders if she knows how to read lips too. It doesn't matter in the end, the details of the matter. It doesn't matter if the added horrors are visible or not, what can be seen at a glance is enough. More than enough. Killian reaches out to gently tilt her face away from Regina and back to him. He smiles softly when their eyes meet, his own deep sorrow reflected with perfect clarity in pools of green.

“I'm already dead love, you know we can't let this happen to Regina.” Hand lifts, knuckles brushing gently across her cheek, trying to memorize every second of this, the feel of her soft skin under him, the way she looks at him. Gods, the way she looks at him, it makes him feel like he could do anything, climb any mountain, overcome any trial. He could fly for her. She looks at him as though he could give her the world and he would hang the sky with every star for her if he could. Killian knows he is going to need every memory like soon enough. 

Yet for all of that, in the end all he can offer her is this. Coldness and pain and being alone once more. He supposes this is how the tale of their love was always going to end.

Just like he’s always known, always said. Villains don't get happy endings.

(Emma isn't a villain. If anyone deserves a happy ending, it is her. The world has demanded so much from her, even before she was born. It has taken and taken and never let her have any lasting moments of happiness. How can the rules make sense, when they deny her the happy ending she so clearly deserves. Just not with him. Regina is a villain too and he thinks this act will only delay her ending, not change it. But perhaps she will be lucky. Perhaps she will be able to save someone else on her way down, whenever her song ends. Hopefully that will be a long time from now, when Henry is old and she has done many more good deeds in her time. He wants something good to come out of his final act.)

“Promise me. Promise me, you won't chain yourself to my memory. Promise me you will grieve for me but that you will move on.” Words are little more than a whisper now, each one straining to be said, forced out through unwilling lips. It is always hard to do the right thing and as much as he wants their love to be True, he will give all chance of that it means she be happy one day. Even without him.

“How can I move on, when I know you will be suffering?” Emma demands, tears still shining in her eyes but refusing to fall, Always refusing to fall, always strong as the rest of the world crumbles and breaks around her.

“How could any of us move on knowing we left Regina here, suffering? Henry deserves better, you know that. Promise me, promise you won't rebuild those walls I spent so long knocking down. You are better than that my love,” he replies softly. He doesn't want her to retreat to that place of pain, to be the guarded woman he had first met. There is still so much love in her life, her son, her parents, her friends.

There is still hope.

“I should pay for what I've done, I was a pirate a lot longer than I was a good guy. I did terrible things, things I can't even remember. Too many things.” They could parade his victims in front of him and he fears he wouldn't recognize all of them.

(Worse, he fears he would know them all. If not by name, then by the memory of how he killed them. Long repressed thoughts would return to the surface like bodies floating up out of the depths.)

“This isn't fair!” Emma shouts, gaze tearing away from him to glare at the fury who still stands there, unrepentant. As though the merits of fairness matter here. As if speaking it aloud would change anything. The fury and her kind go beyond fair, go to something much more basic and primal than the evolved versions of fair they have.

“Life isn't fair Emma! It's not some fairytale, not like that. Bad things happen to good people, and vice versa. I deserve this for what I’ve done and if I can save Regina in the process, if I can make something good out of all the terrible I’ve done, then surely that is worth it?” He needs to tell himself that it is worth it, that the endless pain that is coming will be worth it. 

He needs to convince her, so she can convince him. Let him be strong. Just like before, this one last time. For this real, one last time. Let him be strong.

“It’s save her now or lose her forever Swan. Promise me love. Promise me you will live for me, not die every day just waiting,” Killian pleads. Emma’s mouth opens and closes a couple of times, words trying to form but never actually being said. He waits. The world itself seems to hold its breath on this moment.

“I... I promise,” she finally chokes out, face crumpling as she speaks. Now, at last, the tears fall. The promise makes the moment real. Makes it almost over.

“I love you.” Killian can barely see her through his own tears, vision blurring as he dips his head to brush a kiss against her.

“I love you too,” Emma whispers, lips brushing across his chin, against his cheek, over his nose. Her hands cup his face as she frantically kisses every scrap of skin she can find. 

“Love you, love you, love you.” Her words are as frantic as her kisses, a whispered mantra between every light press of lips as she seeks to cover him completely, as if her mouth can trace every line of him and somehow keep him safe.

“It is time.” The Furies voice is low and he doesn’t know if he is imagining it, but dare he think it, she sounds almost... sympathetic. Not sad certainly, but there seems to be just the tiniest hint of wistfulness in her voice. Killian is probably reading too much into it. 

Tisiphone holds out a hand, waiting for him to take it. One final journey into the unknown.

A blink. The hand is young, skin pure and unblemished. Pale porcelain, there is an almost ethereal beauty about her fingers as they dance through the air, a delicate touch and those are the kind of hands princes battle for, die for. All for the chance to kiss her hand, to lead her in a dance and promise the world.

A blink. Worms crawling over decaying skin, sores festering from where the body has been left to rot. Unmourned, uncared for, time passed over and the world has moved on. The hand that held sway over kingdoms is now little more than food for the insects. 

A blink. The hand is old, wrinkled. Brown spots on the skin. This time the pose is a little less confident, a tremble running through the hand. Time has passed this hand by, and the passage of time has not been kind to it. There is nobody who would fight for the honour of winning this hand now, nobody who could be bothered to look below the surface. 

A blink. Bones. Bleached white by the sun, by the uncaring nature of time. No trace of skin or life remains.

Killian swallows heavily, forcing down the revulsion, the terror that is trying to squirm and break free. She is all of time, existing in one single moment. She is impossible and his mind struggles to understand.

He slowly reaches out, clasping the offered hand, finger curling around her own. It is all of the visions at once, it is none of them all at the same time. It is everything. But also nothing. 

The world explodes into white.

\--

Regina screams.

It is different from before. The noise isn’t that blood curdling howl of before, when her soul was being stripped bare. It is the startled gasp of waking from a nightmare at long last, the strangled scream that cuts off mid sound as reality floods back to you. She jerks upright, hair flicking around her face as she twists this way and that looking for the mental projections of mere seconds ago.

Emma screams as well, something different to Regina’s sound. A wounded cry that sends her collapsing to her knees. She reaches out for the space where Killian and the Fury had been standing only moments before. Where, had she but known it, they still stand, invisible it seems to her gaze. 

His own noise is far gentler, little more than a soft sigh, an exhale as all the adrenaline starts to drain away from his body. Killian suddenly feels every inch his many centuries. Oblivion, does not seem so bad after all this - not that he will be granted oblivion, he is not that blessed. Awareness is his punishment, acute awareness of everything.

“Thank you,” he mumbles after a few moments, eyes lifting from the painful scene in front of them to the strange woman shaped creature beside him. She dips her head ever so subtly, a tiny gesture of acknowledgement. “For... letting me see you keep your word.”

Emma crawls away from him and that breaks his heart. It makes no sense, he knows, but some part of him had almost expected her to know he was still here. To ignore what he had said and still fight for him. It isn't what he wants, but the selfish, the childish, side of him can't help but cry. By this point Emma has reached Regina, the dark haired woman almost slapping her away as she struggles to put herself back together. They are alike, he thinks, more than either of them had first realised. The thought of showing weakness horrifies them. At least they will both live, at least Henry won’t lose any more family. This is one family Captain Hook has managed to save instead of destroy and that is a good feeling.

“Wait. I would know why you are doing this? Guilt? Some misplaced feeling of nobility? The woman has done nothing but harm you and yet you throw away your chance of escaping your fate for her sake. Why?” Tisiphone asks. Her fingers are still constantly shifting through the ages, digits still wrapped firmly around his own. Killian cannot pull away, his whole body feeling numb.

One of the other Furies suddenly appears beside them, her appearance as unsettling as the first. The snakes instead of hair are paler, almost translucent compared to Tisiphone’s but otherwise her outfit is the same. She tuts sharply, a condescending look on her face. 

“Darling sister. Knowing why may be of interest, but it does not change the ruling. To even ask implies otherwise. You should not have even made this deal, the woman was our target but now that it has been made, all time for conversation is done.”

Tisiphone shakes her head, the many tiny snakes snarling in agitation as they bounce around, constantly snapping at each other. She stares intently at Killian, a single tug of her hand pulling him closer as though he was as light as a feather. 

“It is not to change the ruling. I would still know the why of it sister. This one is different and I do not like such a thing. It... disrupts the flow of the world.” Although her gaze is still focused on Killian, words are directed at the other fury, the second giving another sharp tut of annoyance before turning away from the scene in dismissal, voice cold.

“As you say sister. I will return these two to the other living souls since you have decided to neglect our God given duties and have released the woman.” 

Killian takes a step away from them, an unconscious movement back towards Emma and Regina at those words. The grip on his arm melts away as though never there to begin with. He manages a mere step before pale blue smoke curls around the scene in front of him, whisking the women away. Now, more than ever, he feels alone. The grass on which they stand seems to wither a little without the presence of anyone living, blades turning brown and curling into themselves. 

Regina’s house appears to wither as well, the white turning first yellow and then black, brick and board starting to turn and twist, withering in apparent agony. The grating, screech of metal upon metal is enough to make him flinch, a blink and then the house is no more, Killian left to stare at nothing but grey mist.

There is no more need for illusions with a condemned man.

Tisiphone refocuses her attention on Killian, her fingers findinging his skin once more. They burn, searing into his flesh and making his body jerk widely at the sudden and unexpected pain and it is like nothing he has felt since coming down here. The pain comes with imagery, flashes of moments of cruelty. Times when Hook had punished those unfortunate enough to get between him and his desire.

Only, in _these_ long forgotten moments, he is not Captain Hook. He is the poor soul on the other end of the sword, the gun, the sea, the hook. Dozens of different deaths, all playing through him in the same instance. Dozens of different agonies cracking across his psyche like splinter lines on thin ice.

“Didn’t your mother ever tell you not to play with your food?” Words are snarled, arm tugged close to his chest, in every word and action acting like some wounded beast instead of a man. So quickly is he reduced to the lesser parts of himself, the fury starting to strip him bare with almost no effort. It is almost insulting, how he has bent to her already, had reacted and while he isn't broken yet, he had still hoped to give a good showing of himself. To conduct himself with dignity - sarcasm - for as long as possible.

Killian just hadn't expected her to start so soon, not when she had still been talking to him, when he had thought he understood the rules of the game she was having them play. This was interrogation before the torture, when she still had an interest in him as a man and soul. It won't be long until he is nothing but meat to her, another body to be worn down and tossed away.

“I do not play Captain Jones. I obey the unseen mysteries and right now I obey the mystery that is you.” Blood is seeping from both her eyes as she talks, thick, gloopy blood, so dark as to almost appear black. It trails down her cheek in slow patterns, coating the pale skin in stark contrast.

She moves forward and he moves back, a synchronized dance through the mists, faint tendrils coiling around their ankles, grasping vines that strain and brake with the movement, only to reform seconds later.

“You do not fit in any box and you must belong somewhere. You only committed the crime that draws my gaze under her orders. It does not absolve you of such a wicked deed and yet rather than seek to lay the blame at her feet you instead shoulder your punishment before your allotted time in order to protect her. I say again. Why?”

Killian opens his mouth to respond, some witty and shallow response on his lips before shutting it again, frowning slightly. Somehow, any glib remark he can think of dies on his tongue before it can even become a fully formed thought. Somehow, he doesn’t want to simply wave away the last meaningful choice he will ever make with a lie or meaningless remark. Even if there is nobody around here to hear or remember it beyond Tisiphone and her cronies. 

Here, at the end of all things, he can be nothing but truthful. 

The only problem is, he doesn’t know what is the truth anymore. 

Why _is_ he doing this? 

There is a lot of guilt inside of him true, a churning tide of emotions that rise and surge, as chaotic and as uncontrollable as the raging sea. Guilt over everything he has done in his life, everything he didn’t do. Guilt over imagining what it would be like if he had never visited a town or village, had never infected so many lives with his blighted presence. Guilt over the simple fact that none of this would have happened if he had only passed over like he had been asked to. Guilt that Regina had only been in their line of fire because she had come down here after him.

(Guilt of placing her in the wrong spot at the wrong time does not change the fact that Regina did in fact, commit the crimes of which she had been accused. Nor change the fact she technically deserves such punishment. Or that when she dies in turn, this will have been for nothing because they will simply come for her again should she remain in limbo. Then again, logic and guilt rarely go hand in hand.)

Guilt powers so many of his actions. For so long now, guilt had warred with the desire for revenge, had pushed him forward. Sometimes he even wonders if he started to fall in love out of guilt.

He had admitted as much to Emma, the desire to try and atone for some of his crimes by sacrificing himself. His own life put on the scales against Regina and those who cared for her. His own heart being found so wanting in comparison.

Still... 

It’s not guilt that is compelling him. Not wholly. Not the final tipping point. Such an answer is at once too simple and too lacking. Not even guilt on the scale of the emotion inside of him can account for his choice of eternal damnation.

“Do you think they will be pleased by such a sacrifice? Do you think they care?”

No, he knows better than to imagine that this would impress Hades - or more accurately Persephone. It is just one mortal wasting their life for another, delaying the inevitable. If the Queen of the Underworld is here, watching him, he is sure she would be disappointed more than anything else. She had demanded he entertain her and yet he gave in so readily.

“Do you hope to bargain your way to freedom after showing you are capable of great sacrifice?”

No, he doesn’t believe that is the answer either. Doing something good in the hope of getting a reward is just as bad and as wrong as committing an evil act in the first place. Worse, perhaps, because it born of hypocrisy instead of any good instinct, not out of love, or honour or even the simple desire to do the right thing. It is a coward’s act, not his. 

It can’t be the test because Emma isn’t even here. This is something he is doing, not something she is doing.

(He wishes Emma was here. One final look, final smile, final kiss. They have already exchanged those things, twice over and yet it is not enough. It has only been minutes and he misses her as though it has been an eternity.)

Thoughts twist back on themselves, as though they have become the snakes on Tisiphone’s head, countless dark little jaws snapping and snarling, devouring each other.

This wasn't his mess. He should have been focusing on trying to work out the answer to the riddle set to them by Hades. On making sure that there is a way out for them all. Henry should have been his focus - after Emma - and Killian still doesn't know how any of them hope to escape the Underworld. Without the Crocodile and his dark ways, their choices are severely limited. The Underworld does not give up it's souls willingly or easily, be they alive or dead. The return journey is something they would need Captain Hook for.

In this situation, Killian knows his was the weaker hand. Worse that he has played his few cards with poor skill. He should have tried to save Regina yes, but not at such a brutal and final cost.

Why is he willing to give it all up, for Regina of all people?

The chance to go home - the chance to _have_ a home. The chance to be with his True Love. To have Emma in a way he has never had her before. They had been in love before yes, had gone on dates, had saved each other. She had shown real fear and then delight after the events of the story book, when the author had changed everything. There had still been a certain distance between them, a wall of her own making. Emma had fled from the love she had felt, even curled up in his embrace, some part of her had rejected it. 

Then there had been the time as the Dark Ones, when each had used the love they felt for each other as a weapon. A tool designed to try and hurt each other with, sharpened words and looks. Love had been a battle to win, and little more. Then - he had been dead and the then, becomes the now, becomes Emma risking everything for him and them. The last brick in the wall pulled away by the thrust of a sword. He wants to go home. To be with Emma and to know that everyone sees and accepts their love for each other. To be the Saviour’s love, the sheriff’s love, Emma Swan’s love. For her to accept that she loves him true.

Yet for all that, for all that he wants those dreams - and he wants those chances to become a reality, possibly more than almost anything else in the world. The almost, apparently, being this. The almost anything fading away because it seems in reality, what he wants more than anything in the world is for Regina and the people of Storybrooke to be safe, at any cost. Even his own happiness.

Swan and her family really have broken him, ruined the tough, heartless pirate he had once been, left this shade of that monster in its place.

(They have saved him and he doesn't regret it, not for one second. No matter what.)

She waits for him patiently, her gaze as steady and as unrelenting as the watchful moon. He supposes they could stand here for the rest of time, if that was what it took to get her answer. It would delay the inevitable, would put off his torture for another day, another hour. Killian isn’t sure it would be fair though - how strange, to be concerned with the idea of fairness right now, to be worried that any attempt to delay his punishment would not be in keeping with the spirit of their agreement.

Finally, Killian gives the fury a small smile, shoulders lifting in a tiny, resigned shrug.

The truth shines in his mind, slipping into place as though it has always been there. Maybe it has, just sitting there like some dusty crown, waiting to be examined and the gleam of gold to shine through once more. It is so simple and yet so beautiful despite - because? - of it. He doubts it is an answer that will satisfy her but it is the only answer he has, the only thing he can say in response to the why. It burns in him like a fever, words pressing up against the back of his teeth, waiting to be said. The why of it, as she wants.

“Because... it’s the right thing to do.”

\--

“So this is how your story ends,” Persephone remarks.

They stand on the pavement of the main street, watching the world spin on without him, lives playing out their productions. People moving about on their day to day business oblivious to the presence of man and Goddess in their mist. He doesn’t know if this is the real town or the one conjured up in the Underworld. Perhaps it is neither. The unseeing world is far more elaborate than he could ever hope to understand. Archie passes by in front of them, the good doctor apparently human once more and none the worse for his time as a cricket in a jar. Pongo trotts by his side, tail slapping lightly against his owners leg as they walk, the dalmation stopping every now and then to sniff at various items. Archie calls out his greetings to various people as they go, lifting a hand to wave at Belle as she crosses the road further down the street, her arms full of books. 

It is all very... normal. Almost too normal, Killian frowning a little as he stares at the scene. This is not what he had expected, not what should have happened. He is fairly certain he shouldn't be here. And more than certain that she shouldn’t.

“Why... how are you here? I was with the fury...” Killian blinks a couple of times, awareness floating slowly back to him. It takes him longer than he would like to realise it is not normal to be standing next to Persephone. The last thing he remembers is answering the question honestly. Then, suddenly, he was standing here, as though he had been for a while. 

Her laugh is little more than a breathless huff, a sound of annoyance rather than amusement. She lifts a single delicate finger to her mouth, nail tapping against ruby red lips as if in thought. The nail itself is painted a matte black, and it stands out all the more against the metallic sheen of her lips. Not for the first time, he is struck by the colours of the Underworld, the striking contrast so many of its female inhabitants seem to use. They are certainly intent on making a point, a deliberate choice in colours, even if he isn’t sure what exactly they want to say.

“Trying to represent the link between life and death perhaps?” Persephone's suggests, voice sly as she glances to the side.

“I really hate it when you do that,” Killian replies after a moment, and the whole mind reading - soul reading, whatever - thing that the Gods have going on is really unfair. As though they need any more advantages on mortals.

Lips twist into something that ever so slightly resemble a smile. She is more amused than before at least. If nothing else, Killian knows he can entertain a Goddess. It isn't a talent he wants to possess - no good comes from meddling in the affairs of the Gods.

“That doesn't answer my question either,” he reminds her, and they can't stand here forever. By the library door, Belle struggles with the lock, one arm still wrapped around the pile of books she has brought with her. The wind picks up as they watch her, her hair flying up around her face. A sudden gust of wind howls down the street, the force making her stumble a little, using the door as a brace. Grip on the books faltered as a result. 

The cover of the top book springs open as it falls, loose pages flying up into the sky and down the street towards them, the pristine, white, crisp pages instantly dulled by the dirt and grime on the street.

“You still think in such three dimensional terms little man. So limited in scope... Where is your spark? Surely you know this. One never remembers the start of the dream. This is the end of it. The end of you.”

Killian looks down at himself at those words, examining his form carefully. Everything looks the same as before, right down to his somewhat battered leather jacket. He doesn't look like he is ending, he is not fading or rotting or anything like that. Bones are not crushing in on themselves as he starts to blink out of existence. There is no trace of an ending at all. If he hadn't been standing like a ghost, invisible to the oblivious members of the town, he might have thought he was just home.

If this is his end - and really, despite everything, despite knowing she lies as easily as living people breathe, he has no reason to doubt Persephone's words. But if this is his end, then it is nothing like he could have imagined. Nothing like the flashes the fury had inflicted on him, when he had felt himself die over and over again.

“Why doesn’t it hurt?”

“It will,” she tells him simply, and strangely, Killian rather appreciates the fact that she doesn’t try and lie or sugarcoat the situation. He will take the truth, no matter how bad and painful, over a sweet but deadly lie. 

“This is just... the breath before the moment. It’s rather beautiful, in its own way,” Persephone adds after a moment, hand lifting to smooth down her hair, threading long fingers through the strands. 

Belle rushes down the pavement towards them, gaze looking right through him, eyes focused on the papers still fluttering about on the ground. Her attention is only for the written words and even if he had been visible, the pirate doubts she would have seen him as she comes closer and closer, on a collision course. Instinctively, Killian lifts his hands to brace her - only for Belle to run right through him. It makes his whole form shiver, as though he has been dunked in an ice bath. Automatically, he spins on his heel to watch her hurry along. 

So this is death.

“Never thought of death as beautiful.” A lie of course. For so long he had imagined the eventual death of Rumpelstiltskin as some beautiful event, something he would treasure and celebrate and bring out in the coldness of the early dawn to warm him through those hours. He had imagined his own death after the Crocodile’s as a beautiful thing too, something the world would celebrate.

If she hears these thoughts, she doesn’t call him out on his lies and for that, Killian is greatful. Instead, Persephone merely looks thoughtful.

“Perhaps not. Death is so often the enemy for you mortals, is it not? A final enemy to be avoided and defeated for as long as possible. And yet here you are little man. A permanent resident like all before. Throwing yourself into the embrace of that enemy and for such a tiny cause.”

“Saving a life? You call that tiny? There are worst ways to go.” Yet again, he tells himself that. That it is worth it to die. 

(Over and over and _over_.)

“No,” she disagrees, voice sharper than he would have expected, brooking no argument. “There are simply other ways.”

Killian doesn’t know what to say to that. What on earth can one possibly say to that? Silence descends on them, something thick and heavy. It is almost a relief, therefore, when she starts to speak again, even if she returns to the more painful topic at hand. 

“The Furies are unravelling your life moment by moment, as we speak. They seek out the various knots of your existence, the moments that cause ripples and untangle them, smothering you away.” Persephone pauses for a moment, an expression crossing her face that he finds impossible to identify. It is almost as though her next words are physically painful for her to say, as if they cause her anguish.

I have to admit, I did not forsee quite this end. I considered the possibility you would give yourself up to them in order to save Regina’s life of course but I had thought your guilt would eat away at your resolve. Not for you to sacrifice your chance of happiness out of pure... nobility. I find I do not like being wrong, Captain Jones. But there we are. You have... almost... surprised me.”

Dimly, he remembers her saying something about how humans never surprised her anymore, how after the eternity that is her life, she had given up on seeing anything new. He had thought she would be more pleased with getting to see the unexpected.

“So what happens now?”

“Emma will go home and dream tonight, dream of your adventure in my realm and how it ends. And when she wakes... the world will carry on without you as though they had never visited and you had never been.” 

That... doesn’t sound right. He does not mourn his own passing so much as he mourns the pain it will cause others - along with a still present faint surprise that others will be sad. He will not be sorry for his crimes to be erased. But if he had never existed at all... if he had never been in the world at all, then what did mean for those he had actually helped?

“What about Milah? Liam? They passed on because I was here, because I helped them. They were only stuck here because I got in the way and in Liam’s case I was his unfinished business. And wait, what of all the poor sods I killed? Did they get their lives back?”

“A little late to be worrying about them, isn’t it?” Persephone asks archly, amusement tugging on her lips once more. The smile is still too toothy, bright fangs gleaming between the red of her lips. She clicks her fingers, images flickering to life between them, the faces of people he knows. Persephone begins to talk, her voice low and husky. The faces move with her words, shifting and changing in response to what she is saying.

“They passed over. Not even one such as my beloved has the power to snatch back a soul like that. Your life is unspooling but the world adjusts. Events will happen regardless. One could argue that the only reason they remained trapped here was because of you. Perhaps they might not have died when they did. Maybe Milah lives longer, before eventually falling prey to the uncontrollable new nature of her husband. Maybe Liam dies sooner, joins the navy when he planned but struggles to work his way up the ladder under the command of a less sympathetic Captain. Maybe he drowns when the ship he is on sinks, lost with all hands. Maybe a drunk doesn’t drown on his way home because there is now no angry one handed pirate to trip him in for no good reason. Maybe David dies in Neverland because there is nobody on their side who knows of a cure to the poison.”

Another click of the fingers, the noise sharp and reverberating through his skull like a bullet bouncing around his brain. The images vanish in the noise, leaving the two of them alone on the street once more. It has become dark. When did it turn dark? Now that he looks around, he realises the people have disappeared along with the images she created, Belle and Archie gone. The other townsfolk gone.

Then again... maybe it all passes as it did before. Really, at the end of the day, all it means is eternal damnation for you. Unravelling your soul doesn't change the actions made. I do not make the rules nor name the terms. Unless...” Persephone trails off, a predatory glint in her eyes. She fixes him with that unyielding gaze, the one that pins him in place and makes Killian feel as though every thought he has ever had or will have, is passing through the space between them.

“Unless...?” he asks, hearing his voice as though it is coming from a great distance away, struggling to say even a single word. His head is ringing, a shrill note that repeats over and over. It begs him to fall, to give in to her power, to just drift and follow the currents like before.

“Unless you wish to make a deal. I rather enjoy your abrasive humour. Nothing like a little mortal who doesn’t know his place. Submit to me Jones, give yourself to me. I will take care of the Furies, and you will not suffer the endless torments they have planned, the thousand deaths they wish to inflict. Regina will still be safe, in the above. No one will be hurt, nobody will be called to judgement before their time. You will be mine for all of eternity instead of theirs. What is that phrase from your Swan’s world? The devil... or the deep blue sea Captain Jones.”

“No tricks?” Killian asks wearily and he doesn't trust her, of course he doesn't, he can't. She says one thing and always means another. And yet - he wants to in this instance.

“No tricks. No escape of course, but it is a better existence than what they have planned for you. I will allow you some freedom, you are too boring reduced to a shell. You can make all the snide little comments your heart desires.”

She smiles. That smile which is devoid of any warmth or kindness. It is the smile of the Big Bad Wolf before it pounces on the girl or the pigs, the moment the cloak melts away and you see your death. Fang and claw, blood and bone. She is the deadly hunter of the eternal night and the Furies themselves have nothing on her. It is the smile of someone who knows they have the winning hand. The kind of smile that Killian has seen time and time again in his life. 

(It’s always made him want to refuse them, a knee jerk reaction to power that is not his own.)

“And to sweeten the offer... when your Crocodile finally dies, I will even give you some time with him before his judging, let you inflict some justice of your own. You will be well versed, I think, in how we judge by then. You will know what to do and I will allow you to indulge yourself.”

The chance to finally make the Crocodile pay... how many times has he embarked on some mad adventure or dark quest, with those words uppermost in his mind? How many times has he hurt people, some strangers, some he claimed to care for, all because of the mirage of making his enemy pay?

“That’s not what I want anymore,” Killian replies, and the words come out easier than even he thought they would. The truth of them feels like a weighted stone off his chest, and he feels instantly lighter as a result.

He had decided to give up his vendetta towards Gold a while ago, but this is the first time he has actually said as much out loud, the first time he has told anyone. The first time he had allowed that desire to become real.

(He wishes he had told Emma, let her know how much he had changed. To let her know that the love he felt for her, outweighed the need to kill a monster long since dead. That he had chosen, in his own heart and mind, to let his hate go. Another regret to add to the minefield, another ticking bomb just waiting to explode.)

“A deal is a deal. I will honour it, even with the Furies.”

Her laugh is wild, free. It is the first time he has heard her give a genuine emotion, the first time she has reacted to something without first stopping to think about it, has allowed herself to feel rather than cynically regard each possible outcome before selecting the one that will best benefit her husband and her end goals. The first time he has seen the woman under the ice of the Goddess. After death, his life seems to be full of first times.

“I thought as much. Stubborn to the end, little man. Perhaps... perhaps you do have that spark.”

Persephone gives him a final, deep searching look. Those all powerful eyes bore into him but he doesn’t feel the pull of before, the demand to give in and become the nothing she had created in him once before. Instead, it feels as though she is digging deep, searching through his mind in search of that elusive moment.

She sighs, turning to stare off into the mist, abruptly breaking eye contact. Her back is straight, the Goddess standing stiffly to attention despite not looking at him anymore. A beat. And then two. She sighs again, hand lifting in what he realises now is a dismissal.

“Well. Off you go little man. Off into the great wide somewhere.”

\--

Fragments of his life spin around him, moments flashing in and out of existence. They explode onto his consciousness with a blossom of colour and sound, as vivid and as real as the moment they had first happened. Never in any order that makes sense of course. Never in one single string, following the course of the river that is his life.

One second he is at the helm of his beloved Jolly Roger, screaming orders to his crew as a sea beast rages against them, the tempest it has conjured up drechning him to the bone in an instant. He spins the wheel harshly, the Jolly screaming as she turns into the storm, but Captain Hook doesn’t let the smile slip from his face, not for a moment. They are going to beat this beast.

The next he is playing cards with Captain Silver and his crew, and oh, he is so young. Young and naive despite his cruel life. He wants so badly to belong to something, to anything. He wants to be accepted by Silver and his men. To the older, more world weary eyes of Killian, the show that is unfolding in front of him is so painfully obvious. The little looks, the snickers and rolls of eyes. The way they would top of up his glass and then lift the drinks in toast, only to drink a sip while he downed the whole lot. The young him had never had the chance to build up a tolerance to rum, had barely tasted the stuff before Sliver had invited him for that all important card game. Had he really ever been that young? Too blind to see what was happening, how the acceptance had been nothing more than a cruel trick. So many times at the lash and yet he had never seen the danger of a raised card hand.

His money vanishes along with his dreams of freedom, his dreams of joining the navy.

(The navy had always been Liam’s dream, not his own. He had followed because what else was Killian to do? He would have followed his brother anywhere. It is only much, much later, past the navy, past the first visit to that accursed island, past the death and mutiny and somewhere deep into piracy before he had learnt to truly love what he was doing, to love as well as respect the water. He had fallen in love with his beloved Jolly faster than the sea. His dream had become little more than to sail upon her, to be free.)

He is smiling at Emma as they climb a beanstalk, the wind catching at his clothes. Hook is easily used as an instrument to aid his climbing, the metal point digging into plant instead of flesh. He had set out on this quest to learn more about the saviour, to see what he could gain from them before reporting back to Cora. Emma had seen through his disguise by the time he had opened his mouth and that had intrigued him enough to throw away his careful laid plans, to offer his allegiance to her instead. He had always been reckless. They could fall and die at any moment, and yet he grins wildly, another few feet climbed. He’s not felt this _alive_ since before Mil- well, since before a lot of things. 

He is sobbing into Liam’s side as the door slams shut in their faces, the men in dark coats and sombre expressions crowding the room where Mama lay. They won’t let her get up and come and play with them and he doesn’t understand why. They talk of her going away and it makes Killian cry harder. Mama would never go away without them, she would never leave them, certainly not to go somewhere with weird clouds. They said she would be happy where she was now. How can she be _happy_ without her sons? They say she is already gone and he wants to scream at them, wants to fight his way past all the grown men, to where she is lying asleep. He doesn’t understand how she can be asleep right now, why she isn’t proving that they are all liars. He wants his Mama.

Pan’s shadow is rushing towards him while Tink shouts something and he is flying through the air.

Rum is poured into his glass and he swallows it in one go, barely feeling the burn as it works its way through his system, age and experience letting him call for another and another. 

Sword lifts high above his head as the Crocodile tries to reach for Excalibur, wrist and hand outstretched. A devilishly cruel idea is in mind, the desire for fair play and good form reaching its chilling zenith. His moment of vengeance is sweet and at long last, finally here.

Emma is kissing him.

He is kissing Emma. 

He dips in and out of his life in flashes, each one leaving him more disorintated than the last. 

Until eventually, he is back at the start of the end. 

\--

He is standing on the banks of the lake once more, the night drawing heavily around him. If he could feel the cold, he is sure he would be shivering. 

In front of him knees Emma, cradling... oh. Cradling _him_. Or rather, his body. His skin is too pale to be normal, eyes closed, those long eyelashes Swan is always teasing him about dusting against his cheeks. Inspite of himself, he can't help but stare at his body in some strange fascination, taking in every feature. 

Anyone would think Captain Hook had never seen a dead body before.

Blood has dried around the hole in his chest, the darkness staining his clothing further. His arm hangs limply down his side, fingers brushing against the grass. The wound on his neck has reopened, a matted trail of blood tracing down his skin there. It didn’t have the chance to bleed for long it seems. 

Killian hadn’t seen any of this last time, hadn’t realised how long she had knelt there with him, long after the blood had stopped flowing, long after it had turned sticky and then hard. It takes hours for the blood to congeal in such a manner. Hours that she seems to have simply spent cradling his empty body. She had really sat here alone for such a long time? How had none of her family found her yet? 

Her fingers are matted with his blood and with a sickening lurch he realises she must have tried to stem the blood, that despite everything, she had tried to keep him alive, had tried to save him. She must have known the futility of such a thing, that one wound from Excalibur was impossible enough to heal. Two, was beyond a miracle. That was how this whole mess had started after all and yet she had tried to save him, had coated herself in his blood in an unthinking attempt to keep him safe. 

Emma flings back her head and wails. It is a soul destroying, keen of a cry. A wounded animal that has been pushed beyond any and all limits. It is a cry of loss, a sob for everything that could have been, lost in two swings of a sword. It is a howl at the moon, a demand for justice, for vengeance, a scream to be heard by the Gods. The same scream his heart had made when Milah’s own had crumbled into dust before his very eyes. The same scream he had made in his head when she had vanished from his sight, consumed by the darkness and all that had been left behind was a dagger with her name oh so innocently inscribed on it. 

It is far worse than the scream she had cried when he had vanished in front of her back in the Underworld somehow. Or maybe it’s the same, maybe it just feels worse because it is happening this moment and he is standing here listening to it, helpless to do anything, unable to make it better as his own heart begs. 

She rocks backwards and forwards, still holding onto his body, tears streaming down her face. Emma makes no attempt to hide them in this moment, too caught up in her agony to worry about what someone else might think if they came across her like this. The tears drop haphazardly down on his skin, pinpricks of heat on his face that Killian swears for a moment he can feel. 

Legs move of their own accord, crossing the short distance between them to crouch beside her. He knows - he knows - that he cannot interact in these moments, that he is little more than a ghost, an after image burning its final few seconds but Killian can not just stand there and silently watch while the woman he loves breaks apart in front of him. He reaches out without thought, without a plan, nothing in his mind but the desire to try and comfort her, to take some of her pain away. Hand passes straight through her. Right. Of course. 

He pulls back, a curse on his lips. He can’t even hold her like this. Killian doesn’t want to see this any longer. Perhaps it is childish of him, weak but he has had his fill of his own life, of all the pain and demons that have followed him throughout the years.

(New torture, whatever the Fury dreams up, will almost be a relief.)

It feels as though he has been reliving this moment longer than the others. He feels separate in this moment compared to the other memories, a thin wall of ice between him and his physical self - hardly surprising since this cannot be a moment like the others. He cannot relive a memory when he is dead in it.

Then again, each one had felt like a forever in the moment. An eternity in a single grain of sand. A memory cast in immortal amber.

Which begs the question, whose memory is this? Not Swan’s, that much is clear. Not his own, for obvious reasons. He looks around, searching the shadows cast by tree and bush, trying to discover who, if anyone, had been there to see this. He had thought they had been alone. And if someone had been there, why had they just watched Emma cry over him? 

In the moment between blinks, he could have sworn he saw Persephone, standing at the edge of the lake, a look of utter sorrow on her features. Only a blink, and then she is gone.

Killian doesn’t know if he imagined it or not. Perhaps he is going mad already, tormented by the hiccuping sobs of Emma, her voice growing raspy and worn. She lifts a trembling hand to her face, brushing away tears and leaving a smeared trail of his blood in its place. Her breathing is still heavy, uneven but as he watches, he can see her try and put herself back together in some, shakey form, can see her attempt to pull her armour over all these open wounds. She is hiding away Emma Swan behind the mask of the Saviour. Later, he knows, she will go to Gold, she will realise she can follow him into the Underworld.

She will let Emma win out over the Saviour in that moment, and for all that it failed, he is so proud of her for letting herself feel something, for choosing the woman over the role. He only wishes it had worked out better for them - for her. He wishes she had not thrown away her love on some washed up pirate like him.

For now though, she puts her walls back in place and tries not to feel a thing. For now, she denies herself the pain of her grief.

“I love you,” Emma whispers, her eyes fixed on his cold face, a heavy finality in those words. 

She presses her lips against his own, tears falling unheeded on his cold cheeks. At the same time he dips his head, ghostly lips over her forehead, kissing at the air a millimeter before her skin. A kiss of regret, a kiss of love, a kiss of goodbye. Blue eyes close, trying to stop the tears that threaten to spill out. He feels the world start to spin again, finally tugging him out of the moment, the sensation of lips against his own growing stronger and stronger.

Killian opens his eyes.


	10. Chapter Ten

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Author's Notes:** Wow I can’t believe we actually made it to the end. Thank you so much to you guys for sticking with me through its inconsistent updating. All the kudos and comments have meant so much to me and kept me going through what was at times, a very painful story to write. 
> 
> I hope you all enjoy this final chapter.

## 

** Chapter Ten **

####  _**so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep. - Pablo Neruda**_

__  
He sits up, utterly disoriented by yet another change in the landscape.

Disorientated by the fact he was lying down, by the sensation of forcing himself to sit upright. He has a body to sit upright in. White. Everywhere, is white. Not the white nothingness of the fury, when the world had exploded into white that erased everything. Nor the white warmth of souls moving on from the ghastly limbo of the Underworld. It doesn’t burn into his eyes and make him look away. It is far more mundane than any of those lights. In fact, now that his brain is starting to come back online, he realises it isn’t really a light at all. More like some kind of physical presence, a brightness that seems to cling to him, wrapping itself around him, as though he is the creature creating the lack of colour. 

For a whole second, while he thinks this, nothing happens.

Then the white shifts, falling before his very eyes, Killian belatedly realising it was some kind of sheet. With a quiet rustle, it coils in his lap, letting him see the room at large. Vision is fuzzy, the male slowly blinking away the water that has formed in his eyes as he tries to focus on one of the blurry shapes in front of him. 

Killian is beyond confused. The world is still spinning on madly around and he is still along for the ride it seems. He was convinced he had been guided off after one last turn around the globe, one last dance and then the wild hunt was destined to continue on without him. And yet here he was. Somewhere. Somehow. 

Unsure of what else to do, he starts to make a mental list of what limited things he is aware and sure of. First of all; He is indeed sitting upright, somewhere. His body is trembling slightly, hundreds of tiny goose pimples running across the length of his arms and chest. He isn’t wearing a shirt. His legs are cold. He was lying and is now sitting, on something cold and metallic. 

His lungs are burning. Chest aching in pain and it seems to tighten further with every passing moment, the sensation rapidly becoming the most important thing for Killian to focus on. He has only just arrived in whenever he is, and already something is very wrong. 

It still takes him an embarrassingly long few moments to work out what the problem actually is.

Oxygen. Or rather, the lack of it. 

Breathing. He needs to breathe again. Somewhere along the way, during his time in the Underworld, he had simply stopped breathing. His body didn’t require oxygen after he was dead and although for a while he had carried on, eventually he had simply stopped. And now, Killian was paying for that. He draws in a great gasping breath of air. Lungs seem to burn all the more as the cold air rushes in, the breath quick turning into a cough. And then another, and another, deep choking coughs as he struggles to make his body work as before. Hand lifts to his mouth, trying to stem the choking, trying to keep his innards, inside. 

Somewhere to the left of him, a door is pushed open and he hears a high pitched screech, but Killian is too distracted by more immediate things to even wonder what had created that sound. He forces his lungs to move again, focusing on breathing in one long breath, holding it for a few seconds and then breathing it out, another smooth motion. In and out. In and out. 

Gradually, the cough subsides and he can breathe without pain. He can breathe. 

He is... alive?

Alive and sitting in the morgue of a hospital it seems, his eyes dipping to look at the white sheet he has been covered in, the metal table he had been lying on. The stink of antiseptic is almost overpowering in his nostrils, the sharp stench making him want to gag all over again. He has been to a morgue in Emma’s world once before. Slipping in under cover of darkness in order to see Baelfire himself because he hadn’t been able to believe the news. He had searched through the small silver doors, and even though he had been expecting it - hell he had actively been looking for it - it was still a shock to pull open a door, drag a tray out and find the man he had once longed to call son lying there. As cold as death, as still as the grave.

Baelfire had looked so small, under that sheet. So lost. He wishes he had never gone. Because no matter how much rum he drinks, no matter that he goes to the funeral or the gravesite, he cannot replace that image in his mind. He cannot shake the memory of the last sight of Baelfire, the unpardonable insult his brain had played upon them both.

The final image he has of Baelfire, is of a Lost Boy.

At least there is no wobbling monstistries of jell-o in this part of the hospital. Thank heaven for small mercies at least. 

Hand drops slowly from his mouth, pressing against his chest instead in wonder. A faint red line marks the spot where the sword had been driven into his flesh, the skin there raised in a bubbled scar. As though the wound had happened months, even years ago. As though it hadn’t been a fatal blow and instead he had been able to heal from it. Killian shivers - partly out of cold but mostly out of memory - able to feel the blade of Excalibur vividly, the sensation of it plunging into his chest burned upon his brain. 

Dying tends to leave a mark on a person.

He is alive.

In... the real world? The same realm he had previously died in?

He's not completely convinced that is what has happened. If this is real. Could it be a fever dream? His very last second before the furies descend, stretched out and out? Perhaps it is even worse, and this is his torment dreamed up by Tisiphone. Is this a trick? Some cruel game played by the furies in order to get the vengeance quicker? Killian has no idea what to think, no clues to use to try and solve this puzzle.

No. That isn’t completely correct. 

There is one clue. The noise from before, the high pitched scream. What had cause that? Slowly, he looks around the room for the source of that sound. Dr. Whale is standing a few feet away, eyes wide, mouth opening and closing as he tries to say something. The man always looks pale, but right now Killian thinks he could give the sheet he is wrapped in a run for its money in which is more white. 

Dr. Whale... is not dead. He didn’t come down to the Underworld with Emma and her family. And really, if the furies had indeed created some over the top elaborate fantasy world to make him suffer in, then yes, they might have included the doctor eventually, dragged up his face and form from Killian’s memories but there is no way that they would have the wits to make Whale be the first he sees, no way they would have been able to find him so clearly, so quickly.

He is alive.

In the real world.

In his world. 

(Maybe.)

The Enchanted Forest had long since stopped being his world. Long before Swan either. He had been a man between realms, a man who called a ship a home and would accept no other mistress. How times have changed.

“I... I... wha..” Whale finally stutters, pulling out a handkerchief to wipe at his face. He seems to rub at his eyes a little too long and a little too hard, as if he could somehow wipe away the sight in front of him. He gives another small start upon finally taking the handkerchief away and seeing Killian still sitting there and starting back at him. In any other situation, he might have found the sight amusing. Now it just frustrates him.

“What... how are you _alive_?” Whale asks, moving forward and tugging the stethoscope up and around his ears. The doctor in him seems to overpower the fear or confusion, occupying himself in checking for vital signs. Killian lets him listen for a heartbeat, because he wants to know if there is one too.

“Oh come on mate,” Killian complains, instinctively retreating to a place of sarcasm in order to protect himself. To find a little of something he knows and understands in this latest twist that is the mess of his life. “Out of everyone in this town, I would have thought, _you_ , would be able to cope with a dead body coming back to life.”

Whale’s mouth drops open again, stammering and unable to respond. Really, you would think he has never seen a corpse transform into a living creature once more. He never was particularly quick on the uptake. Not unless it was some medical emergency. Then he could swan around in control, barking out orders always safe in his own little bubble.

Killian looks down, lifting the cloth for a moment. Colour drains from his face as quickly as it had from Whale, gaze snapping back to the doctor. The fury in his eyes makes Whale shrink a little, trying to inch away from him and back towards the door.

“Where the hell are my clothes?”

\--

The sun is just coming up as he staggers into the town, staring around in sheer amazement at the sights in front of him. Warm sunlight spills over the buildings, casting various shop fronts and trees in the early morning glow. The colours are right. The sounds are just as he remembers them. Not a fraction off, a little too cold or a little too high pitched for comfort.

Killian had give up on the idea of seeing Storybrooke again like this.

And now here he was, wandering along the main street in something of a daze. Most of the people avoid his gaze and give him a wide berth, some going so far as to cross the road once they spot him. He doesn't blame them - as far as most know, he is probably still the Dark One. Those that stare longer no doubt have heard more recent gossip, that he had died. No doubt trying to decide if the stories had been greatly exaggerated or if he was something magical, conjured up to cause yet more trouble.

Or maybe they are just staring at the oversized grey t-shirt with the hospital’s logo emblazoned on it that he is wearing under his leather jacket, the hem almost reaching his knees. He swears it has been designed to fit Tiny and no other.

The baggy shirt rubs against the mark on his chest, swiping across it now and then, causing a low level irritation that is not high enough to cause him genuine distress but keeps him aware of it. A fly constantly buzzing in his ear. If this was hell, surely the pain would be worse? His own shirt had been cut away from his body, the better to examine the wound left behind by Excalibur. 

All Whale had been able to find for him to wear had been this monstrously, the only clean top that wasn't too small and he hadn't wanted to let Killian go down a few sizes in case the fabric constricted too tightly against the impossibly healed wound.

If he didn't know better, he would have thought this some particularly uninspired joke on the side of the good doctor.

At least they hadn’t destroyed his jacket, Killian reaching up to grasp the edge of it, rubbing at the soft leather between his finger and thumb. Somehow, it had avoided getting any blood on it and as a result he could wear it safely. It makes him feel a little bit more like himself too. Even if Killian isn’t sure anymore of who that actually is - and who he wants it to be.

He looks at each person as they pass but none of them are the person he is looking for, the person he needs to find. None of them are Emma, and he is starting to feel desperate. If he can't find her, how hard could it be to find someone who had gone down go the Underworld, who could tell him what had happened from their point of view and more importantly, where Swan is.

Hell, right now he would settle for bumping into one of the dwarves, they had a talent for not only knowing all the goings on of the town, but an unnerving ability to be able to find Emma no matter where she was hiding - and he had tested it. Truly, a terrifying power, one that rivaled the Dark Ones, and the thought of a loud dwarf screaming bloody murder showing up when he and Swan were in the middle of something truly... personally, was one that had haunted his dreams for many nights.

A gasp draws his attention, Killian stopping and turning around to face the woman who has stepped out from the shop behind him. Not, alas, the woman he wants the most to see.

“Hook?”

“Regina...” Killian’s voice is raspy, mouth and throat dry. At least he knows now that she has made it back and if she has, then surely, so have the rest. There is no way she would have come back without Henry and Henry would have refused without Emma and his grandparents. She stares at him blankly, as though unsure of what to even think of seeing him alive.

Regina looks... very well, all things considering. Far better than the last time he had seen her. Once again, her hair is perfectly styled, not a single strand out of place. Her makeup is intact, not the running mess of before. It is as though the torture of the Furies had never taken place in her mind. Killian hopes she will not act like that, will not put a buffer between herself and the pain. As terrible as those moments had been,

“I... how do I know it is really you? And not some new dark game Hook?”

He is getting rather sick of having to prove himself. No matter how justified it is in this moment.

“I don’t have time to play twenty questions with you, your Majesty. I have to find Swan. Have you seen her?” He makes no attempt to hide the desperation in his voice, tone cracking a little at the end of his question. He _needs_ Emma. Only when he is in her arms again, will he be able to fully believe that this is real - that he is home. Only with her, will he actually be home.

A small smile curves onto perfectly formed lips as though he has answered her question. 

“She’s down by the docks,” Regina tells him calmly, Killian instantly turning to look in that direction. It won't take him long to get down there but any delay is unbearable when it means more time before he can be ruined with his love. Not to mention yesterday - had it really only been yesterday? - he could have clicked his fingers and crossed vast distances in a single thought.

“Let me help you find her.”

Deliberately, she moves to his left side, her action and motion slow and measured. Regina reaches out, offering her hand for him to take. Not just to him - offering her hand to his hook, a silent gesture that he could never have imagined would have come from the Evil Queen. It was acceptance, the kind he dreams of. Killian swallows heavily as he lifts his arm in response, hook wavering a little in the air, as though uncertain where to land. She curls her fingers around the metal and he doesn’t think anyone has ever touched his hook like this before - aside from Emma obviously. Nobody else has ever seen it as anything other than a weapon, something to fear or to use. The only time people touched it was when they wanted him to use it.

It had taken time, but Killian had grown used to Emma being different in that regard, to the casual way in which she would take his hook as though it was simply a hand. In turn, even Emma, his sweet, sweet Emma, had needed time to adjust for all that she saw the man before the hook.

He doesn’t remember the first time they had met. Sometimes he lies awake at night straining for those out of reach memories, searching through every rum soaked image in the hope of catching a glimpse of blonde hair. It feels as though he should be able to remember. Something as all important as meeting the love of his life for the first time should be worthy of remembrance. He can picture that village they had stopped in, he can even remember the tavern itself, after a fashion. Emma however, is shrouded in shadow. 

Getting to watch from the sidelines as Emma had shimmed her way up to the past version of him is not the same. He had turned away, unable to handle watching that. Besides, he had a job of his own to do.

(Sometimes, he dreams he is under the ocean, a mermaid luring him to his doom.

She has blond hair and green eyes and he thinks if this is his end, then it won’t be so bad. Her hands play suggestively with his hook as she lures him ever deeper into the dark blue. Not in a way that would imply she wanted to hurt someone with it or wanted him to hurt someone with it. But simply that it fascinates her, the tips of her fingers tracing along the curve of the hook.

He swears he can feel it, as though metal has been transmuted into skin. 

Killian never stops to wonder why he can breathe under the water. Her lips brush up against his ear as they float, suspended in the nothingness.

“What are you boys playing?”)

Purple smoke coils around them both, Regina transporting them by will. They reappear on the docks, a hundred or so feet away from the Jolly Roger - and the world falls away from him because she is standing on the deck, with her back to him. Maybe somewhere, Regina says something, maybe she lets go of his hook. Or maybe he pulls away, he really couldn’t tell. He really doesn’t care. Killian doesn’t take any notice of any movement, legs working on their own accord to cross those final feet. He reaches the bottom of the gangplank somehow and stares up at her. She is still standing with her back to him, unaware of his gaze.

“Swan?” His voice is soft, softer than it has any right to be, breath catching in his throat as he stares at her, struck anew by how much he loves this woman. She turns, whole frame shaking a little as though from fear.

Her eyes are red from the weeping. 

Emma hesitates for the briefest of seconds, before she is launching herself down the gangplank towards him, throwing herself into his arms.

“What? How?” Her words are swallowed up by her kisses, Emma frantically tracing along his jaw and neck. There is no doubt, it seems, in her mind that he is real. He doesn’t think he could have taken yet more doubt, not from her.

“The kiss,” Killian mumbles, hearing the words of the riddle. They had lost when he had given himself up to the Furies. And what else could it have been but the kiss? Emma was the product of True Love, her parents had given each other True Love’s kiss. Emma herself had broken a curse when she had kissed Henry. It was indeed, what their band of heroes were known for.

“At the lake, you kissed me... it was a True Love kiss... that’s what they meant when they said we had already done it.”

“Then why didn’t it work at the time?”

“Because I was already dead. I... she.. Persephone sent me back. I was there when you kissed me and I kissed you at the same time.” He is guessing of course, but something in him tells him his theory is the correct one, that for whatever reason she had freed him from the Fury. 

“I don’t care, I don’t care about the details, I’m just glad you’re back.” 

There will be time enough for explaining later. For trying to unpack everything to discover if he is even right. After an eternity of darkness and loss, there is finally time. He laughs, unable to help himself, relief blossoming through him, body relaxing a fraction as the reality of this moment begins to sink in. He is home. He is free. They are both free.

“We did a True Love kiss! You, Swan, are bloody brilliant.”

“No,” she disagrees, a bright smile on her face. Her arms are still wrapped around his neck, and it seems she has no intention of moving anytime soon. Which suits him down to the ground. “We both are.”

\--

Things aren't magically completely better of course.

They all wear their scars, new layers pressed down on old ones. New fault lines running through their minds, and the past has become even more of a minefield for them to navigate. 

He acknowledges them though. For perhaps the first time, they both do.

Killian Jones is a broken man and Emma Swan is a broken woman. They do not cover each others jagged edges so much as meet each other in the middle. They make each other better while still accepting the wounds they have, old and new.

The enemies and battles don’t stop coming just because they proved themselves to be True Love, because they gained the favour of some actual Gods. Hades and Persephone are never going to come riding to the rescue at the last minute, and none of their enemies need fear the intervention of the divine.

(Persephone did appear for a cup of tea once, causing all manner of panic, one dwarf crying out the end of the town was here. It had taken a town meeting and a lot of reassurance on both Emma and Regina’s parts, before the rest of of the people were convinced that she wasn't here to claim a whole town worth of souls on behalf on her Lord and husband.

Throughout it all, Persephone had remained almost infuriatingly calm. Aside from turning Ruby into a stuffed toy for a few minutes when the wolf had leapt at her - and changing her back once Granny promised to make sure Ruby wouldn't try and attack again - she hadn't put a single toe out of line.

She had smiled meekly, accepting the delicate china tea cup Belle had offered, sipping the floral brew with evident relish. It was a refreshing change, she had announced, to be able to have a drink in civilized company. 

That knowing look in her eyes had never faded, little more than an eyebrow raised in amusement at all panic. By the end of it, she and Belle had become almost friends, the librarian engaging her in a long discussion about various books and their authors, most of whole Persephone had met during their passage through the Underworld.

Killian is sure she rather enjoyed all the uproar.)

But he and Emma learn to enjoy the quiet moments without fear or guilt. To take each day as it comes and try not to worry too much about tomorrow or things they cannot control.

He and Rumplestiltskin are never going to become drinking buddies, swapping stories about their days over a beer and rum.

But they can stand to be in the same room as each other. The insults that fly back and forth whenever they are planning something are - for the most part - almost light hearted. Familiar, well worn, an old coat they have slipped into now and then. They are as close to friendly as they can get and a world away from where he ever imagined they would end up.

He even manages to accept the hint of Dark One that still lurks behind Rumplestiltskin’s eyes, the occasional flash that always makes him flinch a little inside. The urge to try and banish that power always rises in him at that flash, an instinctive horror against what it had done to him but he always pushes it back away, refusing it any control over him.

It’s not his decision to make, to go to war against Rumplestiltskin and the Dark remnant. He has put down his personal crusade, and he will not pick it back up.

(If Rumpelstiltskin ever allows the Darkness full control again then that, of course, will be a different matter. He will not be the first to lift a hand and reignite the battle between them but neither will he stand idly by if great danger threatens.

He will not allow the Crocodile to come to life once more and hurt the people he cares for. He knows this. They both do. If anything, it makes the strange bond between them stronger.)

Killian doesn’t do it for the sake of peace in the town, or because he knows Emma would like it. He doesn’t even do it for Belle’s sake, although he knows she deserves a little peace after everything that has happened to her. He doesn’t do it to honour the memory of Milah, because while he knows now she would not want him to stain his soul even further with her husbands blood - and what is more, he finally cares enough to realise her wishes are paramount - he still cannot disgrace her memory by pretending it is for her. He certainly doesn’t do it for the Crocodile's sake.

He does it for himself. 

He does it because with a heart full of love instead of hate, he gets to experience moments like this;

Sunlight peeking in through the window, an early morning pale light that filters in through the gap in the curtain. It illuminates part of the bed, strands of golden hair threads across pale sea blue pillows. Killian had woken with the dawn, too many centuries of ship life and in turn with the sun to allow him the luxury of sleeping late into the morning.

Still, there are worse things in the world to be doing in the early morning than lying in bed and watching Emma sleep. He tilts his head to look at the woman he loves, his smile warm at the sight of her. The mornings are his moments to simply indulge himself, to drink his fill without Emma getting embarrassed at his stares and blushing. He does love it when she blushes like that, but he loves her like this too, open and unafraid. Completely relaxed and trusting him in her sleep, a state he had once feared they would never be able to reach.

She shifts a little, eyes fluttering open, the sleep still hanging heavily in them. Emma is so relaxed, so at peace and it makes his heart sing to know he is the main cause behind her happy stare. Not the only - he is neither arrogant or selfish enough to assume or demand that he be the sole light in her life. She has the rest of her family, she has her friends and her job. There is so much good in her world, so much joy and he is blessed to be a part of it.

Killian has more than just Emma now too. He has in Henry the son he has always wanted, he has the Charmings to a degree. Their relationship is never going to be straightforward, but it is a lot warmer now. He no longer feels as though he is constantly having to justify his mere existence to them and while he knows he will never be exactly the sort of person they would have imagined for their Princess, he also knows that it doesn’t matter, not really. That he might not have the title they craved but he is _exactly_ the right person for their Princess. That he loves Emma, and will always cherish and respect her - to them, that is what matters at the end of the day, once they allowed themselves to see it.

He has friends of his own too, people he can relax around, people who don’t care about his reputation or the ghosts that keep slipping the chains of his past. He has a family that stand up tall beside him and are proud to count him as one of their number.

(He has hope.)

“Morning,” Emma mumbles after a couple of moments, voice thick with sleep. A lazy smile slants across her face as she speaks, Emma just as clearly enjoying the view she is presented with.

“Morning,” he whispers back, voice angled low so as not to break the spell that is woven around them. It is so peaceful in their bedroom and he knows once they get up then that peace will be broken. In a good way for once, the rest of the town just waiting to descend and celebrate the happy occasion. They will open the door, walk down into the kitchen and no doubt before they have even finished breakfast, Snow will be there to finish planning the party, despite her repeated instances that Emma not need to do anything for it.

The party is this afternoon. Snow White said it was ‘tradition’ in this realm and he doesn’t know which of them has it worse; Emma is going to be surrounded by everything pink and girly. While he is supposed to go down to the pub with most of the men of the town and - as far as he can make out at least - drink himself silly while they give Emma all manner of gifts.

It sounds very... separated and he isn’t sure he likes it. He would rather they did something together than two parties. They will be with their friends and that should be reason enough to get up, to celebrate still being here, to celebrate everything that is new and wonderful. Still, he can’t help but want to linger in this bubble they have created. It is a far cry from their early days, when they had struggled upstream against every obstacle that tried to break them apart. At times it had felt as though it literally was every possible obstacle littering their path. Curses, Dark Ones, Gods. 

The universe, it seems, has finally gotten the message that they belong together and are here to stay. That they love each other and are building a new life together, one that will leave all his past adventures in the shade. There is nothing in his past compared to the thrill of his life right now.

“What you thinking about?” Emma asks softly, hand lifting to mask her mouth as she yawns. Killian can't help but smile at the sight. So simple, so domestic and yet everything he could have ever wished for. Gold and gems are a fool’s treasure if the choice ever becomes them or this. 

Oh... just the past.” The past in all is terrible and wonderful glory. The journey he had embarked upon all those years ago, all the twists and turns that it had taken to get them here and he wouldn’t risk changing a single step, no matter how painful or terrible some of those turns had been. He will do nothing to risk this present. 

“Is everything alright?” Her tone is concerned but not unduly worried, Emma struggling a little as she pushes herself up on her elbows to look across the bed at him. The movement is not as graceful as it was a month ago and the books tell him it might get even harder for her to move around before it was done. It was bloody sexy nevertheless. She was bloody sexy.

“Aye love,” Killian replies, a warm smile on his face. He reaches out with his hand, fingers brushing over the growing bump of her stomach that is their growing child, tracing a gentle patten there. 

“Everything is perfect.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, thank you all for reading! 
> 
> ~Acantha


End file.
